Swan Queen Survival
by FjFandom
Summary: After Cora has died Regina finds it hard to face all the horrors left behind. When Emma stays to help her get through them they develop an emotional attachment talking about the horrors of their past. May have changed this into a magic baby fic... but in the words of Zelena. Details, Details.
1. Chapter 1

Regina stared at the woman in front of her, the woman, that she desperately had wanted gone from her life, just a matter of weeks ago, the woman, who she thought wanted to break her, wanted to take her son away from her, the woman who was now offering up an apology, she was standing at her door, apologising, because she thought, because she _knew_ that Regina was pathetic, for wanting her son, for thinking that she could keep him,when of course, the Saviour would be the best for Henry.

"Miss Swan, I need no apology from you," Regina said sternly, holding onto the door for support, trying, her best, ( although it may not seem that way to Emma, to Emma it looked like wanting not to crush her bad enough to be willing to break her door.) to keep herself calm, to not use magic.

"My.." She shut her eyes, concentrating on not blasting out her rage. "Our son, has to stay with you. It's my decision, he has to, because if he stays here, I can only harm him."

Emma stepped forward, wanting to somehow comfort the mayor, but Regina had her head held high, and she felt as though moving any closer would get her reduced to ashes, so instead she tried what she thought to be a sympathetic and knowledgeable smile.

"Regina, he doesn't want to, I don't want to, but we spoke, and I think it would be, possible, if he were still to see you, once or twice a week." Her face etched into a look of desperation and almost sorrow, Emma kept her hands at her side, waiting for the reaction, looking down at her feet, somehow feeling foolish, but there wasn't one, Regina was standing there, her angry stance had fallen, her eyebrows knitted together in confusion. The Sheriff was allowing this? She slammed the door and turned around and leant against it, her body slumped and fell down, being dragged down by her weight, she wanted Henry here, desperately, but the hurt, the pain, the nightmares, he can't see that. Her chest ached, wanting him to stay here, but knowing that the reason he couldn't help her, was because he wouldn't be able to. She brought her hands up to her chest as she felt herself collapse, using a hand to muffle the sobs, muffle her pain.

Regina slammed the door in Emma's face, she snapped her head up, _what the hell?_ I mean, She was under the impression Henry wanting to stay here was good? What was the former queen doing to herself, punishing herself? She sat down in her confusion, against the cold steps, head in her hands, what did this woman want from her, to jail her own mother?

"Regina..I.."Her words trailed off, could she hear her crying? She can't be. This was the Evil Queen we're talking about, right?

"Regina, are you… are you okay?"

Crap, was the one word running through Regina's mind, she heard her, she pushed herself away from the door, leaning against the wall next to it, trying to gather herself, what was she supposed to say? Did she want Miss Swan to leave? No thoughts came to her mind, she wanted to be alone, but she wanted someone to tell her it was okay, that stupid vulnerable side of herself for so many years she pushed down. The one she desperately needed to suffocate now, or didn't, she still didn't know what to do or say to Emma. Someone who knew her vulnerabilities, someone who she might be willing to show them to.

No, you mustn't think like that, mother would hate it, but mother is dead, said that tiny voice of hers in her head, the one that would dare to defy her own mother, the one that dared defy herself,

And before she could stop herself, a tiny "No," escaped her lips, between her sobs, she pulled her knees in closer, not wanting herself to break into tiny little pieces and fall apart.

"Do you, want me to come in?" Emma spoke reluctantly, but couldn't let Regina hear it in her words, if this was the way a war was to end, so be it.

Regina shook her head, her hair falling in front of her face, realising no one could see her, she let out a muffled "No." which she desperately wanted to take back and lock away in a room somewhere in this mansion, the door quietly opened, a confused Emma behind it, closing it gently she let her eyes glance around the room looking for her and knelt down to where Regina was slumped down on the floor, holding herself in her arms.

"I..I don't need you here." Regina managed to stifle out, trying desperately to stop herself from crying. Pathetic.

"Regina, you need _someone_ here." She said softly, inching herself closer, trying not to set the Mayor off, but Regina pulled away, shuffling, more like.

"Don't you have something to do, Sheriff?" Regina spat out, glaring up at her, with such hurt in her eyes, Emma didn't quite understand what it was supposed to tell her.

Emma took a deep breath in, and carefully, held her hand out, almost asking for permission, to wrap it around Regina's arm when no response came she held it lightly,her thumb making small circle shapes as a trace across the sleeves, trying, for one of the few times she ever thought she would, to comfort the shaking woman who was broken and laid out in front of her.

"Well, If I'm supposed to help this goddamn town helping the mayor might be a good start."

Regina tried to stare right at her, she tried to give her a look to tell her to back away, but her eyes fell to the floor, she was too tired. Too tired to give fight anymore.

"What happened?" Emma spoke softly, trying not to agitate the powerful woman in front of her,

"You were fine, for you anyways, a moment ago."

Regina sniffed holding back her tears she lifted herself back up from the floor, shaking off Emma's hands and regaining her stance. She wiped away her tears, her face contorted looking down when her hands were wet with them. Pathetic. She snapped her head back up holding it so very high, chin up, eyes now glazed over with a cold stare that she was used to giving people.

"Show yourself out." Was all she could say, before she spun herself back around and keeping composed, mind, holding onto the banister, with all the grip she had, almost making a mark in the wood.

Pathetic, she heard the word again in her head and let go, her eyes glazing over again, her heart glazing over, with a coldness that allowed herself to ignore all emotion, and she glided up the stairs.

She felt a cold hand grab at her wrist and she tugged away, twisting herself around to see Swan, angry at her, her face moulded into an awful shape staring right through her, she felt it jam right through her chest and almost made her step back. But she kept her composure, as always.

"Why haven't you left Miss Swan? I recall politely asking you to leave." This made Emma's eyes pierce harder, trying to shed Regina of her dignity, no doubt.

"No."

Regina stepped forward, her usual threatening stance, her nose an inch away from Emma's.

"Excuse me?"

Emma stood up straight then, her eyes relinquishing Regina from the hold they had on her.

"No. I won't leave, not until we get through whatever the hell that was, and whatever the hell this is," She motioned her hand towards regina, trying to explain, "And I'm stubborn as hell incase you hadn't noticed"

Regina kept her face where it was, her body following, trying to make emma squirm, and for what it's worth she could feel it,  
"Well that would be apparent considering your lineage, but I am going up to my office and for your safety, I strongly suggest you leave. Immediately." Regina turned and kept making her way up the stairs when she heard the soft footsteps behind her she snapped around.

She turned to see emma folding her arms, ready for anything, as it would seem.

"Miss Swan I." She was cut back by Emma standing up another step.

"I suggest, Madam mayor, you carry on because you will eventually have to show some emotion at some point and I'm not leaving until you actually show some sign of being a human being." She raised her eyebrow, cocking her head to one side, showing her resilience, Regina growled, Slowly turning back and making her way up the grand stairs. Emma smiled to herself, she wasn't done. Maybe she could help. Maybe, this evil queen, could step down from that, and thinking on this, by not blowing Emma up when she opened the door, maybe, she already has.

She sat down,cross-legged on the couch, watching Regina at work, it was well out of working hours, but Regina seemed to keep herself busy. Paperwork, some signing, noting down names, filling and then unfilling, again with the signing and the cycle repeats itself.

Regina could feel her eyes on her, digging into her, she wasn't going to reveal herself to her, it was a plan, for her to know her weaknesses, she'd begin to snoop around, maybe look for something to hold against her. Eventually after an hour of having Swan dig deep into her, her eyes never faltering, regina stood up and opened a cabinet, and two glasses, pouring the alcohol into the both of them, she shoved one under the sheriff's nose. Emma just stared up at her, her eyebrows in a race to reach her hairline.

"What's this?" She accepted the drink and bleakly gazed down at it for a moment, remembering why she was here, she let her eyes return to meet Regina's.

"It's good, better than what you buy at the convenience store, no doubt" Regina lifted her drink to her lips, taking just the smallest of sips.

"I'm not cruel enough for you to stay here and watch as I drink, it's rather good, you know."

"Thanks" Emma spluttered out while Regina sat back down, the first conversation, she realized, shed had since she locked herself here. It was nice enough, comforting, better than being glared at for over an hour, that she wanted to pursue it.

"How long do you intend on staying here, Miss Swan? Because it is fast enough approaching a time of which i should sleep." Emma pursed her lips, trying to come up with an answer.

"I don't know" Was the only one that made sense. "I mean, like I said, until you show some emotion, some promise. For Henry's sake, I'd like to know you can feel something. You're like a machine, for the last hour, methodically going through your day. It's really freaking me out."

Regina smiled, what was meant to be sarcastic, but Emma didn't see that.

"That's how I've always been Miss Swan, and like I said, what do you plan on doing when it's time for me to sleep? Do you really think I'd be so accommodating as to let you watch me sleep? I can see who's going to be freaking who out now."

Emma let her eyes fall to the glass she'd already half drained. She shrugged her shoulders and glanced back up at the mayor, this was familiar, the way she was speaking wasn't as harsh. She was used to it. She could handle this side of her.

"I dunno. I'll find away to kit out though. Maybe It'll help." At that, the former Queen nearly spat out her drink.

"You think you'll help by sleeping on the floor?" She stood up and tried to push past Emma, but she was quicker than she thought.  
"Um, yes actually, someone like you isn't seriously telling me you find it easy to sleep, after what's been happening?" Regina let out a breath, of what she thought to just be stress but Regina saw it more as acceptance, if she tried to hurt this woman, maybe even kill her to silence her, Henry would never forgive her, Maybe even she, herself, the part of her she wanted to not be evil anymore, wouldn't forgive herself either.

"Actually no, I sleep just fine Miss Swan." Which to Regina, she thought was true, she never remembered what happened at night when she woke up, not until recently anyways, she had to find a way to get Swan to leave, but considering she drank a lot already ( a full glass) then maybe she'd succumb to the drink before Regina would fall to the darkness that would come with sleep.

"Well, I certainly hope you brought something for yourself, because the only thing you can borrow is bedding." Emma smiled and followed Regina out of her office.

"Why do you have more than one guest bedroom?" Emma could practically hear the eyes that rolled into the top Regina's head.

"It's a mayor's mansion." Was all she could get out, while laying down a blanket for Emma and a single pillow on the floor, after Emma protested as to just staying over in the next room. When Regina Nearly let slip with magic as to why, but she managed to refrain herself. Emma simply replied with 'I need to see it for myself', and since they left, she has been pondering what the _it_ is.

Emma's eyebrows folded in on each other, Regina was being extremely silent, she was refraining from snapping back at her.

"You can sleep there," Regina coldly stood back up and Emptied out a set of pyjamas from her walk-in wardrobe, "I'm going to go get dressed, assuming if you have trained your pa-" She stood up straight, she had to be kind for him, he hated this. "Trained your _magic_ well enough, you can use it to gift yourself something to wear?" She spat out the word magic, snarling at it. Emma's only response was a little nod, and she sat down on top of the blanket that had been laid out for her. Maybe she could use magic, if she could try, but then she remembered the way Regina had despised using the word but had corrected herself even though Henry was at the apartment. Regina was trying and she felt as if using magic would be insulting, besides she hadn't learnt much, other than magic that involved a lot of self-defense. She was still in the same position, thinking when Regina walked back into the room in a pair of silvery-blue silk pyjamas, and even with all makeup removed, she walked into the room owning it, looking stunning, even in pyjamas.

"Well Miss Swan, i certainly congratulate you on trying so very hard on processing my leaving words." She chuckled as she slid under the covers, turning off the lamp, Emma just nodded, not saying anything, wondering why regina was being so… off, for an evil queen.

When Regina let the room fall into darkness, she knew that she was in for a sleepless night, because if she let herself succumb to her unconscious, she knew what would happen, nightmares would come, she would wake up, back to being alone, only that the awful Sheriff would be next to her, asking what happened, knowing her weakness, she can't sleep, not with her there.

But still, at around 4 am, she couldn't fight back anymore, and her eyes unwillingly drifted to a close, and she fell into her fears.

" _Regina dear, you must put on a more suitable attire, we will have guests arriving shortly, and I would be ashamed to announce you dressed like lower class." Cora, glided across the room, owning it, her face carved into disappointment, she lifted her chin, forcing her to look at her._

" _Don't make me ashamed, dear." Regina nodded, what else could she do? If she didn't change Cora would use magic to punish her, or lock her away again._

" _I'll send in one of the servants to dress you." Cora glided out of the room, pausing to look at the dress hanging for her._

" _You need to look beautiful for me, Regina dear, there are suitors coming, much better suitors." She left the room as the doors made a soft clang behind her, Amable entered, shuffling along, lifting the dress as she came in toward the room.  
_ " _I can dress myself, you don't have to be here." Amable bowed her head,_

" _Forgive me, but I was told I had to make sure you would be in this dress," Amable shuffled away, knowing of Cora's magic she most certainly feared Regina for it._

" _What's your name?" She wasn't threatening, she merely asked. Regina finally turned towards the maid, she was certainly beautiful, and a little courageous as it would seem._

" _Amable." Regina nodded, turning towards the mirror, she had seen her around their home a few times, she always wore this faded little orange ribbon, it complemented her olive skin, she nodded to let Amable undress her._

" _Well, Amable, if you don't talk back to mother, you should be able to last here. I would like that."_

" _Forgive me, but we shouldn't be speaking, it isn't condoned." Regina began undressing herself, she was never comfortable with other people doing it for her, she felt had no control._

" _Amable, if I wish to speak to you I may, but thank you, I can see you staying here a while, you obey the rules well. I can dress myself as I said however, stay here until I am, I should wish to talk more and if you leave whilst I am not dressed, mother would know." Amable nodded and simply stood by Regina's side._

" _Do you like how you live, as a servant?" When amable stared at her blankly, Regina turned to look at her, still changing herself. "You can talk freely to me, when we are alone, I'm not like my mother." Amable nodded and spoke softly._

" _I am treated quite fairly by most, and even if I do not like the harshness of Royal words, it is my place, and I should like to keep it." Regina nodded, considering this, it felt like a well-rehearsed answer._

" _I meant, when you sit with your family, are you happy?" Amable stiffened at this question, rather noticeably, wondering why she was being made a friend._

" _I have not got a family to go to, that is why I am a servant, to get by, but yes, when I am at my home I am happy." Regina pulled on her dress and gestured for her to help._

" _Amable I want an answer of a friend, why are you happy?" Amable began helping her into her dress,_

" _I am happy because I have my life, and good meals, and a bed at night, and maybe I am happy now because you are kind." Regina nodded, and turned to meet Amable_

" _Are you my new dress maid?" Amable nodded, turning to continue._

" _That is what I was told for the time being." Regina turned to hold her hands._

" _How old are you?" Amable stiffly held her hands back, smiling._

" _14." Was as straight an answer she could give._

" _Well, I suppose I have a new friend the same age as me, what mother wants she shall have." grinning, she pulled in Amable for a hug, the maid obliged and wrapped her arms around her,_

" _Thank you."_

 _A loud burst open from the doors made them bounce back._

" _What is this?" Cora flew into the room waving angrily at amable._

" _Mother she didn't do anything I just - !" Cora waved her hand to silence her,_

" _What were you doing?" She turned on Amable, taking a step forward, forcing her a step back._

" _Mother it wasn't her, please don't harm her!" Turning back to Regina, she used her hand this time to silence her, with magic._

" _I said enough Regina! Now what was going on, You don't honestly think you can befriend my daughter could you?" She forced Amable five foot high up against the wall, holding her by the neck with her dark magic Amable now letting hopeless tears sliding down her cheeks._

 _Regina tried to scream out for her, wanted to help her, she ran out in front of mother but she was slammed back full force into the desk, Cora wasn't going to use her hands to keep her back, she was in the force of her magic and it was controlling her. The pain of the fall forced more tears down Regina's face, but as she looked up at Amable, who was staring at her, so fearful and frail, grasping at her neck, legs dangling._

" _Don't ever defy me!" Regina tried to scream for Amable, but she could only mouth the words 'I'm sorry' As Amable stiffly nodded, staring blankly at her as her body became limp and Cora let it fall back to the floor._

" _Now dear, clean yourself up and come meet us back down at the hall," waving her hand to let Regina speak again. Regina nodded, running to Amable, who was on the floor as soon as her mother left, but she wouldn't respond, she couldn't find a pulse, nothing, as she sat there, with the friend her mother killed, she took her ribbon, she couldn't let mother kill her completely._

She woke with a start, racing out her bed and down into the kitchen, wiping her tears from her face she grabbed herself a glass of water, sitting on the couch grasping at it she let the sobs hit her, she cascaded into tears silently rocking herself, she placed the glass on the table, and wandered off into her study. Opening one of the drawers she pulled out a ribbon, among other things, she walked around back into the bedroom, not noticing Swan was gone she wrapped the ribbon over and over in her hands, trying to hold back her sobs she let out a weak "I'm sorry Amable." And continued to cradle herself under her covers.

"Who's Amable?" Emma said, coming out of the en-suite, turning off the light as she scrambled next to Regina on the bed. She merely let her sobs overwhelm her, If she didn't now, Emma would ask later, when she wasn't ready.

"She was a friend." Regina fell into more tears, gushing out nonsense, holding the ribbon close to her chest for sanity.

"Was that hers?" Emma asked softly, edging closer to Regina, holding her hands out for her, and she simply pulled herself up and let Emma comfort her, sobs soaking her shirt.

"I took it from her, when she died." Emma slowly wrapped her arms around the broken queen.

"Can… can I ask how she died, did.. did you..?" Her head snapped up from against her shoulder.

"Do you really think that I would do that? You see me as that monster?" Emma sat, taken aback, she gawked at her, not knowing what to say. Sniffling, Regina sat back up on her own leaning against the headboard.

"I wasn't the one that killed her. My mother was and only because she was my friend." She stared down at the ribbon intertwined with her fingers.

"Amable was kind and beautiful and she didn't deserve her fate." Emma nodded.

"Is that why you were yelling for her in your sleep?" Regina stared up at her shocked.

"What?" Emma's head fell, she didn't know?

"You were moving around, talking about your mother and then you let out her name, but then you stopped, so i figured it was nothing." Regina nodded, silent tears falling down her face.

"I dreamt about her death." Emma moved closed to her, holding her arms out to hold her, Regina shuffled into them but she didn't know why.

"Why are you here?" She asked after long moments of being rocked back and forth, Emma let out a sigh.

"Because you're dealing with this on your own and you shouldn't have to. Everyone thinks you're so awful and evil and I won't lie, you probably were, but this Regina, can't be left alone."

"This Regina is weak." Emma held her head up, holding her.

"No, this regina is human." She rocked her back and forth "And that's okay. Do you want to tell me?" Regina nodded, still crying.

"This was hers, before I knew her she wore this every day. She was my new dress maid, she only lasted a day." She turned her body to face hers, nuzzling herself into Emma's neck, crying letting out the harshest sobs.

"She was helping me change, and.." Her voice broke and she cried even harder, pulling emma in, scrabbling to not let the space fade between them, her chest ached with her sorrow and she felt Emma's hands stroke her hair, rocking her softly.

"Mother came in after I hugged her, she killed her with magic. I stopped screaming because she used it to stop me speaking. She killed her. She killed her." Regina broke down then if she hadn't already.

"Hey, it's okay she's not here." Emma's hands swept through her hair, trying to comfort her, when after an infinity Regina stopped her sobs she pulled away.

"I'm sorry." Emma held her hands out holding Regina by the arms.

"It's okay, it's why I was here, but It's already five so you need to sleep." Regina shook her head her eyes wide.

"No, No! I can't don't make me!" Emma slowly pushed her down pulling the covers over her.

"I'll wake you. I promise," Regina sniffled holding back more tears and again unwillingly shut her eyes and drifted off to sleep to the sound of Emma's breathing, to the soft touch of her hands flowing through her hair, to the warmth of her body next to her.


	2. Chapter 2

**Okay so the end of this is going to be very graphic, and not in the sexual sense, so prepare yourself if you are squeamish, but don't worry it leads to swan queen** _ **trust me!**_

She slowly drifted awake, her eyes fluttering open and the room felt cool and calm, looking down at herself she saw the pale arms around her waist. She lifted them slightly, trying not to wake the clingy as hell Swan next to her, to relinquish her hold on herself, but somehow the semi-asleep woman next to her curled up closer, practically goddamn spooning her, when she felt the bouts of anxiety, reminding her of times she wished she could forget, of unwanted arms, unwanted people, clinging to her to hurt her, but as Emma nested her head in the crook of her neck, and she felt her warm breath, the anxiety from fears of her past fled, and the scary truth emanating from her right now flooded in. she was enjoying the touch of someone,of _Emma Swan_ , holding her and protecting her, and her unconscious self liked it too, because for the first time since the curse broke, she had had a nightmare free sleep. As Emma's arms tightened their hold she knew she couldn't keep herself here for much longer, regrettably, she squirmed to get free of her hold but Emma's stupid sleepy self held her tightly, her head came up to rest atop Regina's shoulder, and freaking kissed her jawline, moving her lips up she kissed to her ear and whispered, "Stay".

Her hands began to wander, one moving slowly down and resting above her knee, as one just slightly lifted to above where her heart was beating frantically in her chest. What the hell was she doing? Regina shoved off Emma with all her might and even that didn't wake her, she opened the curtains flooding the room with sunlight, and left Emma there, where she went to go and have the coldest shower she ever took, considering her past life, and ran the thoughts through her head of the events of the past night.

She knew she had shown all weakness she had, over her maid, her friend, possibly the only one from her childhood, even if it had been for five minutes.

She knew that emma didn't care, and was there.

She knew she had fallen asleep next to Emma.

And she knew she had woken up in her arms.

And worst of all, she knew she had liked it, the comforting feeling, and maybe on some level Emma enjoyed it too, because it was her arms that she had wrapped around her, right? The frustration was enough to set her magic off and she ended up setting her freaking sink on fire, somehow, panicking she relinquished her magic and stared down at her hands. What the hell happened? 24 hours and all the thoughts she had turned to swan! She had to remember she hated that woman, stepping out of the bathroom, towel wrapped around herself, her hair up in a wet, yet not the least part sloppy ponytail, she stopped in her tracks, Emma was sleeping so soundly in her bed, the rays of sunshine lighting up her face, she moaned and rolled over to face her, still asleep regina carefully pulled the covers over her. That didn't wake her, so she slipped into the walk-in wardrobe and dressed into a tight dress that showed off all of her curves, and some heels that extended herself quite spectacularly, today despite her weakness and flaws she literally presented to swan on a plate, she was going to find out the truth about what the Sheriff's sleepy self wanted. What the Sheriff's true self had wanted, at the very least.

She walked back into the room and saw her sitting up on the bed, staring down at the ribbon in her hands.

"How long have you had this?" Regina stiffened, she was reminded of the way that Amable reacted when she asked her questions just trying to be her friend.

"36 years if you count the curse. She died when I was fourteen." Emma's head flung forwards as she muttered the word 'shit' in disbelief. That maybe was because of the length of time she kept it but maybe also including the fact she was fourteen and her mother murdered a girl in front of her eyes at that age.

"Why do you ask?" Emma stared blankly at the ribbon in her hands.

"Because I thought " She paused trying to find her reasoning. "I thought you were some evil queen bitch with no feelings, but you spoke about her, like you were young, you cried about her like it's been so long but is still there, and I suppose that's how it is to you." Regina nodded, her heart not in the effort of the action.

"I suppose it is like that, yes." Emma nodded, and returned the ribbon to her.

"Swan, can we.." Her voice was caught unsure of what to say.

"Emma can we talk?" Emma looked taken aback, and started pulling on her jeans and trousers from yesterday.

"Sure. go." Regina shook her head, letting her hair fall over her face.

"That's not what I meant. I mean a discussion, that might last a while. Shall I make breakfast."

Emma stood up then, fully changed. "Uh, sure."

She followed regina out of the room.

Regina made a breakfast, which she laid out in front of emma, consisting of pancakes, and a lot of fruit to go with them, and creams and syrups and jams and marmalade she had, and apple juice which Emma made a point to steer away from, even though she knew Regina wouldn't poison her.

"Why do you want me to stay and talk?" Emma asked, after several long minutes of no conversation.

"I want… i want to get over whatever this is, and I hate to admit it, but you actually helped."

"How..?" Regina raised a hand to stop her speaking and continued.

"After we talked about Amable, and I slept, I didn't have a nightmare." This seemed to have no effects on Emma, she didn't understand, dropping her cutlery to the table and wiping her mouth she leaned forward, trying to express the situation.

"Emma, I haven't had a dreamless sleep, since the curse broke, and I have a feeling I still had these nightmares before hand, but I forgot." Emma sat back in her chair, pursing her lips

"Every night?" Regina nodded, leaning back.

"And I thought we should discuss this morning, that can't happen again Emma, I don't know what it was, but I was uncomfortable, and.."

"What the ribbon? Jesus Regina I was just asking how long you had it!" Emma's hands flew into the air to express her point.

"No, what? I'm okay with the ribbon it's the displays of …. Affection." Emma laughed leaning back in her chair relaxed.

"I think you did have a dream-filled sleep after all." Regina scowled at her and let her knife clatter against her plate.

"Miss Swan I was not fantasising If that's what you're implying, you…" She paused, she had no clue how to say this, it did seem as though Emma was right, this was crazy.

"You had your arms around me, and you were, kissing my neck." Her expression changed from amusement to confusion.

"I… what?" Regina bowed her head feeling ashamed. "Why the hell didn't you wake me up?"

"I couldn't i just, got out and took my shower." Emma sat fully back in frustration, knotting her hands through her hair.

"Hey Regina I'm sorry, I must've been asleep and " Regina held her hand up.

"It's okay, I know. But can I ask you a favour?" Emma rolled her eyes, she thought she knew what she wanted.

"Sure, I won't breathe a word of this to anyone. I get it." Regina shook her head her hair falling in front of her face.

"No, I mean yes, please don't tell, but I want you to stay and help again tonight, because I know I'll have more sleepless nights, but you have to understand, you helped. Nothing else has. Not even magic." Emma nodded, understanding her emotions.

"Okay, but I can't stay every night." Regina bowed her head in agreement.

"You have no idea, Emma it helped … It just helped." She couldn't explain the extremities that she helped her with just by helping her cry it out.

"I get it. Needing me here, okay?" Regina nodded. She wasn't comfortable with telling Emma she needed her, but in a way she did.

"Anyways, the conversation I wanted to have, isn't about this." She stood up and collected the plates.

"I wanted to ask you who sent you here in the first place, and it better not have been snow."

"Regina, I came here, because you're hurting, and you need someone, and I mostly I hoped you weren't just evil and.. I guess I just needed to see who was in there. That.. That there was someone there at all."

"Emma, there is it's just. I'm trying to be good to Henry. I can be good to him, if he doesn't see me again, not for a while anyways. If I let him stay with you he's safe."

"Regina he's safe here there's nothing stopping him staying here!"

"My Magic is unstable right now, It's tied to my emotions, much like yours, if I'm happy or content it's calm but if I'm angry or upset or even frustrated it's uncontrollable."

"You wouldn't hurt Henry I know this. You're good now, you're trying."

"No! I'm not!" Glass shatters as the lights above them smash in anger, the shards falling, Emma covered her head instinctively and regina backed up to the counter.

"I'm sorry, I told you it's not safe here. Henry can't come home. Not until I've dealt with this. And my magic."

"It's not magic that's the problem, it's your emotions. We need to get through them."

"Well I don't want to talk about my mother or who she killed or whatever Evil she did to me! Or what I did to others!" Regina began sweeping up the glass covering the floor. "I don't want to talk about what haunts me at night."

"Well maybe you won't but I will. You may have cast the curse but my own parent's chose to abandon me! My childhood was crap! Because of them! Not you! So if you stop blaming yourself for things like _that_ then maybe you can be good enough!"

"You don't blame me for what I did?" Regina stood up, sweeping the rest of the glass into the bin, and stared at Emma. Waiting for an answer.

"They could have kept me, but I got thrown into a wardrobe instead. Town or daughter? They chose the town. And I knew I was abandoned, all of my life I have known, but yeah, I have the same nightmares, being rejected by my parent's and I don't even blame you."

"I.. I didn't know that." Regina stepped forward, she wanted to hug Emma but she knew she wouldn't want that, so she brushed her arm instead, making the same movement Emma did, the night before.

"And I'm only here because I thought we could talk about our shitty childhoods and our crap lives and just bond or whatever, because you helped me too, I've never really gotten a good night's sleep since I've been alone, but last night I slept without dreams. I slept soundly, no nightmares and I don't know if it was dumb luck or that we can help each other but yeah, you actually helped. When my own parent's can't."

"Emma.." Regina pulled her in for a hug, squeezing her lightly, when she pulled away she got out a canter and two glasses, pouring them both a drink.

"I believe we should discuss our shitty childhoods and crap lives?"

They had started drinking and talking at 10, and emma had told her about her friends and her foster homes, and regina had told her about her riding and her castle, When Emma told her of her first theft and Regina told her of her first use of magic, and they talked about their first loves and their favourite things and their fears -which was the longest part of their discussion- and their hopes, they had gotten, drunk enough, throughout the conversation. This long discussion Regina had wanted for them had taken them through to after 2pm, both the ladies were slurring their words and admitting things they would never have done sober.

"I wanted to be a horseback champion," Regina admitted after opening another bottle of alcohol.

"I didn't want to ride a saddle and I wanted to use my horse for jumping, like a man, mother called it foolish." Emma sat up, twisting her fingers through Regina's hair absent-mindedly.

"No it's not foolish sounds fun, why haven't you ridden a horse here?" Regina filled the glasses again.

"My prized steed died for my curse I gave it up because it didn't make me happy" Emma's face turned into a pout and her hand slipped from her hair to her neck.

"Emma you're doing it again." Emma shook her head, as if to quiet her.

"You need to be happy, why can't you just be happy for me?" Regina scoffed on her drink and smiled at Emma cheekily.

"I should be happy for you?" Emma nodded and moved closer.

"Bad choice of words." She said, after an eternity, both their words now had slowed, like it took concentration to even speak.

" _With_ me." And then full force (for a drunk person) Emma rammed her lips against hers, trying to be romantic and kissed her, her arms moving down her back pulling Regina in, and for a moment, Regina kissed back, but her arms move to Emma's shoulders pushing her away.

"What is this?" Emma shook her head again leaning back in, pulling Regina closer.

"Don't speak, you'll ruin it." Regina forcefully shoved Emma away.

"No. I need to know, is any of this true?" Emma nodded but kept her head down.

"Of course, but i was.. Awake this morning. I just.. I like you. And you shouldn't be sad. I want you to be happy." Regina nodded taking in the information.

"With you?"

Emma once again agreed.

"But if you don't like it I can leave."

Regina sat, looking to the distance, or even the freaking abyss. She couldn't figure out what was going on, she wanted this, she knew from the moment she returned Henry to her, that there was something here. But there was always going to be that small voice in her head. Mother's voice.

Pathetic.

"Go."

Emma pulled back, a face full of shock, her hands slid back down from their position they kept on the small of her back.

"I-I what?"

Regina pulled back pushing Emma away.

"You need to go. Now. Please don't make me.."

Emma stood up, stumbled a bit from the drink, and sheepishly walked away, leaving regina alone in the room, she fumbled at the door, when she made it down the path she took one last look at the mansion behind her. She thought she saw something from behind the curtain, but maybe she was just a bit too drunk.

When Emma left, Regina stood up to see if she had really left, hoping Emma would run back in to tell her she was wrong, and that she didn't deserve to be alone, that she couldn't leave, but as Emma began to turn around, the mayor hid from the view of the window. Using the wall for support, she banged her head softly against it, expecting the door to fly open, but after moments of waiting for the blonde to rush through the door, she slammed her fist down on the wall, and at that point the passion, the panic, the grief, the pain and the fear all exploded in her magic and it sent the chandelier above the main hall tumbling to the floor, sending shards of glass flying across the room, regina stumbled and fell to the floor from the unexpected crash, not knowing what was happening she fell on many shards and had pieces of glass stuck on almost every face of open skin, some large pieces had managed to rip through her dress and plunged into the skin, that sent the former queen shrieking and hissing in bouts of pain.

"Crap." she muttered through clenched teeth.

She grabbed some things like a medical kit, tweezers, cream and gauze. She would have to clean all this up afterwards, and she knew that magic would only give her more problems, wincing in pain as she made her way up the staircase to the bathroom to clean the mess up. She opened the medical kit, and set out the things she would need, sitting on the toilet seat, legs up on the bath, she grabbed the first thing - tweezers. Starting at her ankles, where there was just small shards, she removed them one by one, hissing through gritted teeth, tears gathering in her eyes the bigger the shards got. When she made it to above the knee on her right leg, where there was a mound of glass stuck, one of the more painful points, she thought quicker, less pain, and rammed the glass out with the tweezers, screaming in agony, when she managed to redeem herself, she got out the cream, she would have to make sure it wouldn't get infected. Dabbing with a wet facecloth she slowly rubbed in the stinging cream across the gash in her leg, finally she let the tears stream down her cheeks, it wasn't as if anyone here was going to see this weakness.

She managed to wrap her leg in gauze and continued with the rest of her body, when it came to her chest though, that was where she was fearful to go, she had to cut up her dress to get to it, and eventually managed to get it off, there were three bleeding gashes there, one, the smallest, lodged in her abdomen, the second which was about the same size, came up to her side, an inch or two higher, leaving other shards in its wake, she dealt with them all quickly, removing, cleaning, creaming and wrapping, but the last, was beginning to leave a vast trail of blood, pooling down onto the floor dripping, she felt a little bit better than she would have been sober, and that was a small comfort but it was a massive shard, that had only slightly fractured and had gone in only a little, but it had made a wound that was almost two inches in length, and was causing the most part of her pain when she finally removed it and carried on in the routine of cleaning it up, the wound was bleeding quite rapidly and was starting to make her feel light headed, nevertheless, she cleaned it and managed to wrap herself in gauze but used some cotton pads to cover it more. Looking down at herself wrapped in bandages, she desperately wanted to heal herself, so she held out her hands straining in frustration, interrupted by the phone ringing she stumbled out of the bathroom leaning on the wall for support. What was happening now? The caller ID showed her son, Henry. The headache she felt was worsening her problems, from the blood and the magic, she couldn't heal herself, and she foolishly picked up the phone, wiping tears from her face and pressed the answer button.

Big mistake.

"Mom?" It was henry's panic that caused her to remember why she hadn't answered his calls.

"Henry" she tried to speak with as soft a voice as possible but her voice caught at the end, not just because of the pain she was in, but because she hadn't heard her son's voice in months.

"Mom are you okay why haven't you answered my calls when can I come home?" Regina let a small tear fall down her cheek. He called it home. Not with snow or emma, here with her, was his home.

"Henry, I'm fine but you'll have to stay with Emma for a bit longer okay?" Regina lay down on the bed, slowly descending, feeling all her cuts and wounds as she sat back down.

"Why mom it's been months? If this is about you being afraid of hurting me that's okay you won't!"

Regina sat up at this, Henry wasn't supposed to know that. For his own good, he had only told Emma that, and now she was drunk and was just telling anyone?

"Henry who told you that?" Trying not to be hostile in this situation was extremely hard, she was hurting but that didn't mean Henry had to.

"Mom, it's okay don't be mad?" But Regina had already hung up on him, scrambling frantically with her fingers, she called the one woman who she despised, but could never hate, because she cared for her too much. Swan.

"What the hell?" She finally spat out when Emma answered after two failed attempts.

"I thought you didn't want to see me?" Emma was still slurring her words, because she had made her way to the rabbit hole, she didn't take rejection very well.

"I don't but what did you tell Henry? He knows why he's not home anymore and he still wants to come here!" She heard a sigh present itself from down the line.

"Regina, he's a smart kid, he knows you, I think he can figure this out on his own. What I can't seem to figure out is why you answered his calls? What changed." Regina collapsed back on the bed again, looking down at herself some of her bigger gashes had already bled through.

"Nothing, I'm fine." She said coarsely, once she had stopped talking to Henry the pain at hit her, hard, she'd forgotten about Emma now, and the wound to her leg was already bleeding profusely, soaked through the gauze and dripping down her leg, she went to touch it and hissed at the pain she'd caused.

"Regina are you okay?" Regina scrambled back up the bed to asses the damage, and whether or not she needed doctor whale.

"I said I'm fine." Although she was trying to ignore her leg, leaning forward and doubling her chest over had caused the most painful wound to start bleeding again, and before she could stop herself a groan escaped her lips, leaning back down a small scream of agony left her.

"Regina I'm coming back.." But before she could hear the rest of her sentence, a black haze took over her and she passed out from the pain.

 **Okay so more warnings at this point there's some suggestion of rape in a memory and the ladies will both talk about their experiences in the next chapter xx.**

"..You clearly can't be alone, okay?" Emma slammed the bill on the table and left, not caring that the bartender was yelling about tips.

"Regina?" The phone hadn't disconnect but she couldn't even hear her breathing from the other end of the line, what was worse was she had been drinking, and randomly poofing places wasn't her speciality, after yelling Regina's name a few more times she gave up and started running down to the mayor's mansion, not caring that she nearly crashed into a few people down the sidewalk, she barged passed the many protesters yelling her apologies as she went. After ten minutes of running and stumbling and her chest beginning to ache, she didn't even bother knocking on the door, she burst in yelling for her. The sight that unfolded in front of her eyes, the broken chandelier, shards of glass everywhere, and the pools of blood. She started racing up the stairs finding her way to the bedroom, where Regina lay, covered in gauze and bandages that marked her body, many of them fully soaked in regina's blood, who in question, was lying on the bed, completely passed out.

"Shit Regina!" She ran to her side, lifting her slowly to the center of the bed, laying a pillow underneath her for support.

"Regina what the hell!" She moved her hands to her neck, finding a weak, but at least _there_ , pulse. She started slapping Regina's face to wake her up, after about a minute, she just resolved that she would have to take this idiot to the hospital, leaned to go grab her phone when her hand was stopped by a cold, yet firm hand enveloping her wrist.

"Don't." Emma stared into the brunette's hazel eyes.

"Regina what the hell went down? Are you okay You were passed out from _this_!" She gestured to regina's still bleeding body.

"Magic, emotions remember? That's what happened, I'll be fine, I just it's the drink and the pain that's all." Emma just stared blankly at her, not believing that she was seriously fine,

"What the hell kind of emotions did this?" She let a hand fall softly on one of the rapidly bleeding gashes in her chest.

"The chandelier smashed and fell because my emotions cause the explosion and I didn't think to take cover I just let it.." Her voice trailed off as Emma's wide eyes implored her own.

"You let it, are you kidding me? You don't have to hurt yourself emotionally but now physically? Regina this has to end! Why didn't you heal yourself with magic?" Regina's head fell down to the floor, her eyes refusing to pick up again.

"I tried, my magic…" She paused trying to find the will to speak. "..It won't do what I want it to, I can't even summon a simple fireball." Emma's eyes followed Regina's movement, she wanted to help but she couldn't see how.

"How do you do it then?" Regina's head snapped back up.

"What?" Emma let her shoulders shrug nonchalantly.

"I've got magic right? So I can just, you know.." She flailed her hands as if to say 'heal you with magic', but Regina got what it meant.

"That's not how it works dear, magic is emotion, how many times do I have to tell you, there has to be emotion in the healing, and I can't even heal myself how are you supposed to?" Emma moved so that her face was directly over hers, and through pursed lips, she hoarsely spoke.

"Regina. How do I do it?" She let out a sigh, and glanced down.

"Obviously you have to have your hands out over me," She waited for Emma to follow.

"And you have to feel the magic inside you, the warmth there, concentrate on the intent, because if you blast me with something other than healing magic, it won't be in my favour." Emma nodded, shutting her eyes, she tried to feel the warmth, she felt Regina's hand on her arm, and the warmth spread to her hands, and it was flowing out of her, in shock, Regina's arm dropped, but she continued, the glow surrounding Regina sent traces of light dancing around her wounds,

"Is that..?" She let out a low chuckle at emma's wide eyes and disbelief.

"Yes dear, that is you." She beamed down.

"You have to stop now, or it'll be let loose, and it's savior magic, no doubt Gold will be in need of some."

"Oh, right sorry." She let her hands fall back and saw the glow diminished.

"You okay now then?" Regina sat up and started peeling off the gauze and bandages she used to cover herself.

"Yes but I can see my carpet isn't." Looking down at the blood trail she left when scrambling up to the bathroom.

"Uh, yeah do you wanna, maybe I dunno, like _lie down_?"

Regina's head snapped to meet Emma's.

"You didn't tell anyone what happened?" Emma's head faltered in confusion.

"Uh, well seeing as I've been here, uhm no?" Regina nodded, turning away.

"Good, that's really ...good." She stood up, then but stumbled, and Emma's hands found their way to her back to support her.

"Are you sure? I can stay, you also have to tell me how your emotions did this." Shrugging Emma away and stumbling to stand again, she held a hand out to stop her, ignoring the black haze seeping in around the edges of her vision.

"I got it, and as for my _emotions_ I let them take control of my magic, albeit briefly, it obviously did some damage. I was upset and angry and my magic made the chandelier explode. I'm fine, however, I think you should go." Emma wrapped her hands around Regina's waist, trying to pull her to the bed.

"Regina, you need to rest, I'm staying and I'll help clean things up a bit, but you need to sleep."

Regina shook her head, and grabbed her wrist to stop her pulling her down. saying one word to let her know her fear, seeing the dark creeping in.

"Mother." Emma closed her eyes, not wanting to terrify the woman in front of her.

"It's okay, I'm here, I mean I help right?" Regina nodded, as Emma set her head down on the pillow, and pulled up the blanket she'd used the night before to cover her.

"Why don't you rest and I'll go grab some things to clean up this mess, and I'll figure out what to do with the chandelier 'mkay?" Regina nodded, letting the black fog consume her sight. This was one of the few times Emma saw her truly afraid, and it was terrifying her to her core.

"David, I'm fine I'm just gonna be back late tonight okay?" She heard a sigh from the other end of the line, He kept calling today since she had stayed last night.

"I know it's just.." He was interrupted by Emma who let out a loud breath.

"Dad I'm fine, How's Mary-margaret?" Although she couldn't see it, David was beaming down the other end of the line, and he let out a breath that she couldn't hear.

".. David you okay?" That snapped him back up from happy land.

"Oh, nothing, just .. you called me dad." Emma sighed, at least it was one way to shut him up.

"Yeah well, I probably gotta go stake-out and all, gotta concentrate."

"Well, your mother's doing better, actually, I think. You'll call me when you're done?" Emma smiled, mary-margaret was doing better, that was good. She heard Regina from inside the bedroom and grabbed the soap and towels she found so she could clean up.

"Yeah I gotta go bye." She hung up before hearing him speak and rushed back into the bedroom, but thankfully it was just Regina stirring, so she knelt down and started scrubbing.

Some moments later she heard Regina again, and she was thrashing around, but since she hadn't yelled yet she figured it wasn't anything awful.

" _Regina dear, if you don't like it I can have it changed." Glaring up at her mother, she spoke harshly, she hadn't forgiven her yet._

" _It's fine mother." She spat out the words as she walked of the podium, her dressing maids following her and picking up the dress as she went._

" _Leave us." Her mother stepped forward and put her arm around hers._

" _You don't have to be so hostile, I've found a perfect suitor for you, he is soon to be King, first in line, and his kingdom is doing very well."_

" _I don't care about his kingdom mother!" That made cora chuckle, which sent shivers down her spine and made her back away._

" _You're only very young dear, if you don't marry soon, you'll be an unfit bride. Now, you'll wear this dress when you meet him, smile, make polite conversation, and make yourself interesting, and don't be hostile dear, it doesn't go well with you." She held up her chin, forcing her to look at her._

" _His family will be here any moment dear, and I expect you to talk to him in the kindest of ways. Like I taught you remember?" Regina nodded, she hated the flirtatious routine, but if he was kind enough she would enforce it._

" _Smile, nod at his words, bat my eyelashes, touch for three seconds and mingle again." Cora shook her head._

" _This is for marriage dear, you linger longer and you don't go and mingle, you stay with him, understood." Though she could feel her eyes pop, she didn't like her mother's decision she nodded._

" _How.. How old is he?" Cora turned back from leaving._

" _He's only a short number of years older than you dear, and quite handsome, he's turning to twenty-eight soon."_

" _Mother! That's fourteen years!" Cora nodded and turned away._

" _Better than most dear, the next kingdom over it was a distance of over twenty years dear, it's quite common, but fourteen is lucky, child." She stepped away and used her magic to open the doors. And stopped, turning her head to the side, not to look at her but regard her in a sense._

" _I trust he'll have your best effort."_

 _The doors slam, and Regina turned to the door when she heard the announcing of the prince, she smiled and nodded at his words, keeping the conversation, she bowed slightly at his kind compliments and when she said nice things back, let her hand fall on his arm for three seconds. He took her arm and led her away._

" _I must admit you have the routine down." His low voice whispered when they were off in a foreign to her corner of the castle._

" _I don't quite know what you mean." He chuckled and pulled her in closer, she didn't fight it he was quite kind to her, and she was afraid but he could end up marrying her, and mother would call her pathetic for being afraid._

" _You do, I must wonder, your mother or your father that thinks you are capable of being my bride?"_

" _Mother" She whispered as he was pulling her closer, she tried to pull away, but he was big and strong and had her in his grasp._

" _You see, I like to take my prize on my own." His hands began to wander, and when she tried her hardest to pull away, he held a hand to cup her mouth, she bit down hard, turning and trying to run but he only grinned and let out a low laugh._

" _You think a small fourteen year old girl can escape me?" Nothing was heard but her low screams against his hand, muffled, and her struggles against him. And he laughed, sending shivers down her spine, his hand moved to her breast and she started crying, his hand caught the tears._

" _Shhhhh. It's okay. I'm here, Regina." What? That hadn't been what he had said.._

" _Regina, you have to wake up!" his hands fell, and slipped away, with each word._

" _Regina!"_

"Emma!" Without thinking she burst out and hugged her, gripping to her jacket, she could feel the tears streaming down her cheeks.

"Thank you." She whispered.

"Was it your mother again?" She simply shook her head, letting the tears cascade.

"Do you want to tell me about it again?" She nodded but replied

"I can't.. Not now." She pulled back from the hug to wipe away her tears.

"Well, I cleaned up most of the mess, and a guy can come and replace the chandelier and take away the old one."

Regina nodded, letting herself come to terms with her memories.

"I should go, Henry'll be wondering where I am. Promise me you'll answer his calls? the kid's worried." To that regina just nodded.

"You'll come back?" Emma nodded, standing in the doorway to the bedroom.

"Yeah, but then you'll have to tell me about what you saw." Regina nodded, and kept herself composed until she heard the click of the front door, and the Queen broke into sobs.

 **Okay so that was all I could think to write just now, I have some ideas for how the story will continue but that's it for now. ;)**


	3. Chapter 3

"Emma wait!" When Emma turned around it seemed as though the former queen was horrified by what she'd just said, yet she continued on. "S..Stay. Please." Emma nodded and stepped back to meet Regina.

"I can't explain, I told you I was fourteen when Amable died, yes?" Emma nodded, not sure what story was about to be told.

"Well, I don't know.. " She paused pursing her lips trying to find a way to tell Emma.

"I've been sort of, re-living memories in my sleep, of what my mother has done, in sequence, the dream I had today, was a week or so after Amables death." Emma nodded again following Regina's eyes as she spoke, Regina could feel it but she couldn't bring herself to meet her gaze.

"He was a Prince from the next kingdom, and he was looking for a bride, so naturally mother had the family visit for him, his kingdom was wealthy and doing well, and he was only 28, I was lucky that he wanted a wife so young." Her voice hitched and that was the point she let her body shake with her sobs, and Emma pulled her in closer, wrapping her arms around her back, making slow circular motions in an attempt to comfort her.

"He took me away from everyone else, to talk and…" She let out a small cry burying her face into emma's neck. "..He grabbed me and I tried to run and scream but I was only fourteen." Emma pulled away and held her face up with her hands.

"Hey, look at me, he's gone that prince, he's an ass, worthless crap and you don't have to see him again." Regina nodded her eyes falling to her hands, unsure of what to do." Look at me!" Her eyes snapped up to meet Emma's and for a small moment she leaned in.

"You are beautiful and amazing and strong, and that pile of shit never deserved to even _look_ at you. Don't ever be upset over such a worthless pile of crap, okay?" Regina nodded and leant in further, she kissed her softly, trying to get a hold of all her emotions and gratitude for pulling her out of her nightmare, she tried to express her love and admiration for the woman who would always save her. When they pulled up from the kiss needing air each woman felt the breath of the other on their lips.

"I'm sorry I wanted you to leave earlier, I'm afraid of what this is." She leant in and pressed her forehead lightly against Emma's. Feeling the stability in it.

"It's okay. I'm here now. I think I might have to to Granny's and get some food that okay?" Regina looked over to her alarm, that told her it was nearing closer to eight.

"Yes, of course." She spoke softly, rising with Emma, who nodded and turned towards the door, regina stopped her and spun her round to kiss her again, she felt the gasp of surprise against her lips but the sheriff kissed back.

"Be here when I get back, okay?" Regina nodded, and Emma was allowed to leave this time. Having left Regina with not much to do until she got back, She stepped forward into the now clean bathroom, and presented herself to the mirror, she wiped away the evidence of tears, having stopped herself from crying and began to wash out the makeup that she'd managed to ruin from the day she'd had, she pulled of her dress, that was cut and torn and covered in blood and slipped herself into a new dress that was similar but didn't remind her too much of the blood-stained one, and made her way downstairs, where she saw that the chandelier had been taken away and the light had been disassembled. She'd have to get a new one, and reminded herself to put it on the list of things that would need doing. She walked hollowly into the kitchen dragging herself into the room, and grabbed herself a glass of water, and then she sat, waiting for Emma to return.

When Emma left the mansion, she was really worried, last time she left regina alone she had managed to hurt herself really badly, and then couldn't heal herself, when she got into the car she drove, fast enough with her hands gripping to the wheel turning her knuckles white, when she got out of the car and into the diner she was greeted by a smiling Ruby, who's beaming smile quickly turned to a frown.

"Hey, Emma you okay?" Emma's head snapped up from her train of thought that was focused on worrying about Regina.

"Yeah two grilled cheeses?" Ruby nodded and turned away with her frown still plastered across her face, Emma didn't even seem to notice she had obviously been crying. Moments later when ruby returned with the food in the bag, she pulled Emma to the side.

"Hey, you sure you're okay Em? Where've you been?" Emma briskly nodded and stepped closer.

"I've been sort of, helping Regina out with dealing with all of what's happened. She's in a bad place right now and I think I'm helping a little." Ruby raised her eyebrow up to the goddamn rooftops when emma mentioned Regina, she chortled when she spoke.

"Yeah sure, is that why you didn't make it home?"

"Come on, Ruby she's not handling any of this well I'm just being a friend!" Emma sighed and her eyes met Ruby's snarky stance, her arms folded and her eyebrows contorted into a fantastical position she never thought capable to tell her 'yeah right'.

"Look, I'm going to go help my _friend_ now, thanks for the food." Ruby laughed and stepped away with a knowing smile.

When Emma returned she found Regina sitting on one of the chairs in the dining room she met when she opened the door.

"Hey." Regina's head snapped up and Emma met a worried look, she smiled and it faded from her face as soon as she saw who it was and stood up to meet her.

"You came back." She stated, and Emma's face looked confused.

"You didn't expect me to come back, did you?" Regina shook her head and her brown hair fell in front of her face, Emma quickly reached up and pushed it back, tucking it behind her ear.

"Hey, I'm here, I'm not leaving and.." She lead Regina to the table dumping the food on it.

"...I come bearing grilled cheese!" Regina sighed and opened the bag, she had to admit it smelled good, after the day she had, and without arguing she pulled her fill out of the bag.

"Woah, no protest? Awesome!" Emma plunged herself into the seat next to the one in which Regina had been a while earlier, and also very much plunged herself into the grilled cheese.

They sat and ate in a cold silence, both women staring intently at each other.

 **Regina**.

She came back.

You're smiling like a kid who just found out it's easter, what are you doing? Pull your smile down!

She's smiling back though? What happened? It's probably something that happened on her way back from the diner right? Ugh. Just eat the stupid grilled cheese.

Note to self : Eat these in secret more often. But pull a face of disgust so no-one can discover how good this is.

She's beautiful.

Damnit. She's not, she's just sloppily eating a grilled cheese, how can you consider that beautiful?

Just look down, don't think about her, concentrate on the food, Why what a lovely piece of stray cheese…

Shit. she's spoke. Um nod? Is that what she wants? How the hell do you do this to me swan?

Okay. good, she wanted a nod. What's she talking about stories for? Oh.

"..Because you gave me two of your stories from your past, I thought it appropriate…"

Damn, her eyes. Okay focus! You can marvel at her _later_! Now you need to concentrate on what she's saying!

"..anything I could just tell you times from bailbonds or what I did when I ran. Would you like that?"

Shit question. Would I like her to talk to me more? Yes. so yes?

"Uh. Yes?" She's laughing. God she's laughing, her hair, I want to .. Shit more words what now?

"Uhm, Regina? You okay?" Talk! tell her yes? I don't know good sandwich? Eyes are green! hair is blonde! brain is broken!

"I'm quite alright dear, just.. Thinking." Was that the right thing to say? Quick mills bury your face in this cheese heaven to shut yourself up!

"Oh, Okay." God, She's amazing, Is this when We get to kiss and she takes away the rest of the world?

 **Emma.**

God, she's looking at me, did she ask me a question? I don't think so… Just smile, she's smiling, woah. Her smile, it's like drugs, okay Regina! Telepathically hear my pleas and smile forever!

Haha! Is she pretending to hate the grilled cheese! She forgets I know her? Great well, Regina I will totally be torturing you by eating these and not giving you ANY. Speaking of- I'm going to enjoy my food without pretending! Why Is it she's so damn amazing even when she's being disgusted from a grilled cheese or telling me about her past herself?

Shit. maybe you should talk? Say something!

"Uh. I owe you two stories." Shit maybe elaborate? She looks so confused. Damn, her confused face is even hot. THINK SWAN!

"Well i figure because you gave me two stories from your past, I thought it appropriate that I owed you two stories from my own. I mean I can't tell you about as many horrors but believe me I have.." Swan you're rambling! What was the aim of this again?...

"I could tell you anything. I could just tell you times from bailbonds or what I did while I ran. Would you like that?"

Shit. course she would hate it. What Are you thinking? Haha! It seems she isn't either God it's funny to catch her off guard!

"Uhm, Regina? You okay?" She's staring at me like I'm meat god, do I do something?

"I'm quite alright dear. Just… Thinking." Shit. please be thinking about me. Do i say something now? Or can I just kiss her face off?

"Oh, okay." OKAY? WHAT? Oh MYYY GOD! She's too beautiful I can't take it!

And they knew they had the same need by looking eachother in the eyes, because Emma pulled her up from the table, food forgotten, and pulled her up to kiss her, Regina gave way to her feelings and gave way fast, She was beautiful, Emma Swan was amazing, and she wanted her.

And She wanted Emma.


	4. Chapter 4

**OKAY LIFE HAPPENED AND MY LAPTOP LOST EVERYTHING I HOPE I RESTORED WHAT YOU LOVELIES DESERVE.**

 **here is what i hope is an adequate enough chapter, and I'm striving to re-do the old chapters I had already! some warnings for more graphic dreams from a certain sheriff.**

 **thank you hope you enjoy, again sorry for the holdback. :)**

"Stop." Emma pulled back from Regina, her eyes questioning her, pouring into her, her hands pulled back and she stepped away, her body language showing the hurt but her face pulled into a small smile, and she nodded her understanding becoming small and feeling deflated.

"No! I mean, well we can't Emma. i want this but right now I just need a friend." Emma nodded again and when it seemed to pull her face down and dragged her spirits with it, regina pulled her chin up so that she could meet her eyes.

"I'm not trying to be.. Cruel here." Her eyes paused and instead of looking at her, they seemed to drift off as she found a way to drag herself back having found the words. "I want this, i probably need this but our son, Emma, he can't be treated like this. He would need to know, I would need to be sure of anything before anything would happen." She pulled emma's face back up when it started pushing down again, heavy in the weight of her hand. "Please, I need Emma, my friend not Emma, my…" Her eyes flashed with horror as emma glanced up hopefully "Not Emma I could care for, because we both know i can't even care for my son let alone myself." Her hand dropped and she began to turn away, emma's expression tearing through her as the sorrow was quick to flash through emma's eyes, she had to conceal her own emotions she had a son, who she could not hurt like this, if it all went horribly wrong what would it do to henry? What would it do to Emma? Would she take him from her? Would she do that now? What would she say to him? How would Emma take this? What…. She was cut off by emma speaking up and clearing her throat, fooling herself into confidence.

"I understand. It's the most sensible thing to cross either of our minds so far. But.." She saw regina' shoulders fall and feared it as she tried not to choke on her words."But if this is ever something you want from me, tell me, but I will stay. Even if I'm just a friend, I'm not abandoning you, Regina. So please, _please_ don't abandon me?" It became a question as soon as She turned around and saw the pained look in the sheriff's eyes that she could see reflected in her own. She nodded as a silent motion of understanding, and gestured for Emma to follow her upstairs. Maybe she would talk about certain horrors tonight, because she knew there must be another horrid memory of her mother to be harshly recalled tonight, but as she saw emma when she spoke and the way she plummeted through her words as her emotions fell through, she hoped she had to be there for her tonight.

 _She plonked the small duffel bag on the covers of her new bed in her small room with her new family. There was no use counting how many days she would stay here, the covers where a stained-grey and the curtains were drawn to let in a bleak sad light into the small, dusted broken room. There was a guessing game she liked to play here, how many before herself? The scratches on the old desk and pen and pencil marks meant that it had to at least be half a dozen, she turned when she heard footsteps coming up the stairs, and nonchalantly pulled her arms and folded them in her chest blocking out the usual welcome, when she saw the woman's pinned up hair though, the thin pursed lips, her business like-attire, and the low emotion in her face, she realised this time she would have to listen to the rules if she was going to test the level of comfort she would have staying here while she scraped up things to get herself gone._

 _The usual uptight bitch, it would seem, she slowly unpacked her things, which wasn't much, but she kept her blanket, extra cigs, and spare sock-money in the duffel that she quickly hid under the bed. She gauged she could spend a week here, at most. She made her way silently down the stairs when the call for dinner was made, at precisely 7pm, when she had been previously told, that was when she met the other kids that they had here, and she could quickly tell it wasn't because she was going to be loved here, it was almost as if they were here as a statement to their society friends, in the hall, there was a large table and plates set out in front of the chairs that were there, four for the kids and one for the woman who had met her this morning, a final chair at the end of the table was without a placemat. Even if this was her home for the next few days, no father to share it with._

" _He comes home late at night, make sure you're sleeping." She turned to her left where a girl her age maybe two or three years older than her, who looked like she knew what she was doing by sitting down, napkin in her lap, somewhat pleased with the small pile of food in front of her, she turned to speak to her and ask her why, though she was pretty sure she knew, and that the girl knew what she had told her, but she was quickly silenced by the 'mother' at the head of the table sitting down, the harsh scrapes of her chair making awful scraping sounds against the floor._

 _Dinner was quiet, and they all left up for their rooms when it was cleaned away. When she was about to leave and push through the door, when the same girl pulled her back with her hand on her elbow._

" _I mean it." And with that she turned away to turn behind a door with a soft 'click'._

 _That night went by slowly, she was sitting and waiting, trying desperately to fall asleep, and the anxiety set in each time she heard the soft hum of cars going past, bunching herself up into a ball, curling her arms around her knees that she had pulled up to her chest under the cold covers that coated her._

 _And then a click._

 _And then a stumble._

 _And then slow muted footsteps._

 _And shut your eyes, slow breathing and keep it paced, and the door opened, creaking slightly, and shut back again, but the stumbling was in her room and she could smell the alcohol on him, and the cigarettes, and felt his breath close to her cheek, his wandering hands pushing her down on the bed and keeping the covers closed._

" _Such a beauty." and the words left a foul taste in her mouth, he ripped of her clothes._

" _Pretty girl, do you have a pretty name?" Emma shook her head, tears spilling out of her eyes. She had to not sob, he would make it worse, he would hurt her, like everyone else always had._

" _Emma." She let out weakly, as he pushed her down. She bit her lip, tears springing to her eyes from the pain and from him bearing down on her, pushing himself against her._

" _Well then Emma, you have to behave for me." It wasn't a question, he wasn't asking anything of her, he was already touching her, pushing his hands to unwanted areas, and Emma knew even if she was asleep when he found her, she would have been awoken by him pushing himself into her._

 _No begging._

 _No whimpering._

 _No sounds._

 _Because it won't make him stop, she knows, from experience, that it will egg him on, and some of the disgusting creeps she knows, will have been encouraged by it, would have asked for it._

 _And when his hand slid upwards to cover her mouth, she slammed her eyes shut, begging the tears not to reach his hand. But they did, and it made him more forceful. And he pushed into her, making her curl herself up into a ball, her way of squirming to escape, trying to convince herself into believing it wasn't happening._

 _Not again._

 _And when in his drunken self finished his business, and left the worst of all thing she hadn't yet gotten from the terrifying experience, he left a kiss, on her collar._

 _Next time, she would sleep, if she had to take all manner of booze or pills to do so._

But for now she would wake up.

And she felt warmth beside her, and could smell something, alcohol like, and she ran off the bed, tangling in sheets and covers landing on the floor, hearing someone groaning and complaining when she heard her not so safe landing, untangling from the bedsheets she ran herself out of the room and down the massive staircase, not caring she was wearing weird silk, almost see through pyjamas as she bolted out the door and stood standing where she was. And when she saw the light flicker on from the bedroom window she panicked. So she fled the scene, running around Regina's back garden to get away, she fled into the forest, choking back tears, she landed herself on a tree stump that she didn't know where she was didn't matter, the fact that she was all alone in the woods confused and crying, didn't matter to her, she would make her way home when she could.

But what was home to her anymore?

It wasn't the last one she fled in boston,

It wasn't the loft in which she couldn't escape her parent's or her son,

But it couldn't be where she had fallen asleep with regina. She was supposed to hate her.

So why did she have the dream that she would have when she had a home?

Stern mother.

Late drunk father.

Unwanted man.

But then she would be awake, alone and at a place she called home.

The tears were streaming down her cheek and she almost didn't hear the soft footfalls of someone advancing in her direction. Almost. But she was quick enough from those years she would always remember, to hear the sounds that would warn her to run.

But that someone ingeniously was actually looking for her, to help her.

She woke with a start, she had felt so cold, and pulling the sheets off of her felt like torture, but it was more so to see that Emma had left, and abandoned her the small space where she had occupied the bed was hollow and cold and she felt more alone than she had when cora had spoken those last words.

Shaking it off, she stood up and pulled her robe around herself, shrinking those words from her mind, pushing herself away from the bed she dragged herself to look out of her window surveying the garden, a small forest of trees behind it leading to the woods she often visited before henry.

She kept calm trying not to let tears fall from the thought of henry not being in his room, when a flash of blonde hair was stumbling out of her garden, running almost, and it caught regina's eye, nose almost pressed against the glass, she leaned forward and made out Emma stumbling blindly into the forest, barefoot and barely dressed shivering from the cold. She pushed herself down the stairs, what was Emma thinking? She had left even her red jacket behind! Grabbing it as she left the already left flung open door and made her way down to the garden, she couldn't see Emma anywhere, had she imagined things? But she held emma's jacket as proof of the fact she had gone. Okay. Calm, she can't have gone far. Swirling her hand over the jacket to enact her form of a locator spell on the hideous garment, she followed it's glow to Emma. She was venturing deep into the woods and she had no idea if this jacket was going to lead her to her, but it was cold and Emma must be alone and henry would blame her for tricking the saviour into something. And why did emma leave? She felt a cool chill to the air and little droplets were making their way down from the leaves overhanging her from the trees above, the sky had begun to grey and she had to find Emma, the only thing leading to her was a light in this field of dark, ominous colours. The light got brighter, began to glow with a golden hue, as raindrops fell sharper and colder against her skin, and amongst the clouds forming and rain falling she could hear thunder as the grey sky flooded in with a darker presence than before, but as she trudged on she found the jacket lighting with more gold filling the red in her palms. And then she heard it, the low sobs and shakes of a lonely girl out lost in the woods, following the jacket slowly she heard them crack and break and the thunder and rain broke out in the sky forming its own storm of sorrow and in that moment she felt omniscient, knowing this was Emma's magic breaking out her pain, she found her alone on this small log in the forrest, hands cradling herself trying to stop her sobs from breaking out of her chest and breaking herself altogether.

"Emma," She breathed, wrapping the jacket around her as it's glow was all colourful and contented itself, returning to it's usual red leather look, and regina softly stroked her arms trying to warm her palms around her, and Emma barely even noticed she was there, she was stiff and had given up on tears as raindrops fell from the sky enveloping them in her pain.

"Emma..?" She was waiting for a response, and suddenly Emma twisted and turned and wrapped her cold frame around her sobbing and shaking and giving in, at the same time engulfing them in the whispy white smoke of her magic, transporting them back to Regina's bed, and neither cared that the mattress was damp, the embrace was keeping them both firm and stable.

"Emma, what happened?" But the saviours head only shook in her arms and buried herself in deeper refusing to talk. It seemed like endless moments had passed, and even though Regina grew cold and wanted to sleep, she knew she had to press on, because Emma had been there for her, infuriatingly managed to stay by her side when she thought she needed to push her away.

"Emma, you have to tell me. Even if it's not really this. You owe me two stories, remember?" Emma pulled back for the first time from what seemed like hours and big green eyes stared up at her, a mix of fear and need pooling there, and she pulled back fully, breaking most of the contact, burying her head in her hands, pulling her knees close to her chest as if it would stop her from breaking into tiny pieces if she spoke.

"It's not.. It's not the dream." Her voice caught as she tried to push it through the unwilling sobs echoing through her, and when she felt regina's warm hand drawing circles on her back, soothing her, she relaxed and felt spurred on. It gave her confidence.

"It's why I had it. I don't know, I've had it so many times before." Another hand joined the other by her arm, edging herself closer to the sobbing woman, she spoke softly in a voice Emma hadn't ever heard her use on anyone, not even Henry.

"Do you want to tell me about the dream, or why you think you had it?" Emma shook her head.

"It's too real, It… It would mean something." When Emma's tentative gaze climbed to meet regina's eyes she saw the confusion there, her eyebrows furrowing, trying to decipher what she said, and she knew, she'd had to tell her, and hope this side of her wasn't cruel enough to push her away.

"I mean, It's pretty much the same as yours, a crappy foster father, but you know, specific, I guess? It's um.. Happened to me before. Lots." She tried not to cry more at the brunette's sorrowful yet too-knowledgeable expression, and let her eyes drift to the soaked sheets.

"I have it, when I find home. Or my crappy version of it, but I'm upset because.." Her voice was strangled, it felt like she was a traitor to let the words out.

"Because I haven't had it since I came here. Until now. Not even before the curse broke." She heard Regina gasp and the hands at her side and back falter, and slip away.

"You only have that dream when the home isn't real, is it? Emma you can't be my home. I'm.. evil." she spat out the last word but Emma didn't notice.

My home?

Regina saw her as her home?

"I'm your.. Home?" At regina's open 'O' Shape of a mouth Emma could have laughed, instead she pulled regina closer enveloping her in a warm embrace without tears of sorrow, hurt or pain. Tears of happiness, meaning and acceptance.

"You're my home, too."


	5. Chapter 5

There were no dreams.

Mother, was gone as it would seem.

There was only light dreams, happy ones. The ones she used to have back with daniel, of a new life together.

 _As she stepped down from her horse, she could see a figure standing underneath their tree._

" _Hello?" She hurried forward, leaving her horse and pulled her arm around the stranger, turning them to see her._

" _Who are you?" The woman turned around a face marked with confusion._

" _Uh… Regina?" Shock spilled through her, this was Emma Swan, and she was occupying the space where Daniel was supposed to be._

" _What did you do to him?!" She pushed Emma against the tree forcing her into it with one arm._

" _Regina all I did was fall asleep and you're in_ my _dream asking what I did to someone?" that caused regina to falter._

" _I.. you're in_ my _dream, sheriff." Emma shrugged Regina off of her and countered so that Regina's back was against the tree._

" _Uh.. Okay so we're in the same dream, but like, why are we here?" Regina pulled herself away from Emma stumbling back from the tree._

" _It's... Daniel's tree." Emma nodded, noting Regina's hostility, she stiffened when she stepped forward, and she took it back._

" _Why are we at Daniel's tree? In our sleep? Together?" Regina shook her head and ran off, grabbing the reins to her horse and climbing back on, speeding off as the horse charged in the opposite direction._

" _Regina?"_

"Regina?" She pulled herself into a sitting position on the bed, she could feel the warmth that regina had left behind. The bedroom door was left ajar and she followed the space left behind. She checked every room she passed by and there was nothing, she wandered into the kitchen, to grab a glass of water, maybe even something stronger, when she noticed a small note sitting on the counter.

 _Swan,_

 _I've gone to find out about the dreamwalk from last night, from my knowledge of such things, I only know there are dangers, many dangers, and we have to know the specifics of both of us walking for the first time, which can bring us to becoming lost in our sleep and I can't have that._

 _Stay here until I get back, and don't fall asleep._

 _Don't even get yourself caught in a daydream. It's not safe._

 _-Regina._

Emma placed the note back down on the table and opened the fridge looking for some food to eat, she fixed herself a bowl of fruit loops and wandered back up the stairs to go take a shower.

She let her mind swirl through her thoughts as the water droplets fell against cold skin.

From the books she had in her vault, she knew three things so far:

Two dreamwalkers can visit each other only if the connection of souls was strong enough.

Dreamwalking is a powerful ability, and it comes from the necessity to communicate or see someone, and is only used with a mixture of light and dark magic.

Anyone who can be visited in a dream by a dreamwalker, has to have magic that counteracts the magic of the walker.

That only cleared up two things.

Emma had to have light magic that counteracted Regina's.

And somehow seeing each other, was necessary.

And the fact that their souls had a connection. Through Henry?

She read further on into the books she had, dream decipherers weren't what she was looking for and neither were dream changers. Not yet, though she made a mental note to read up more on that later for the sake of the nightmare memories that plagued her.

As she came to understand it, the dangers were very high, and you could only dream walk through necessity because of this.

Most of the books told her the same thing, which was that if the connection was broken by means of one of the people in the dream state by any other means than waking up, they become in a sleeping state much like a sleeping curse, living in their dreams.

The only way to break that, was to put them _in_ a sleeping curse, and reviving them from that, it was too complicated and dangerous.

Word of the day.. But still- That couldn't happen.

She brought the books in a pile next to her trying to find how to stop themselves from dreamwalking.

She gathered her things and stepped out of her vault, almost dropping all of her items when she saw Henry lock eyes with her in the street, his sweet little face contorted with a mixture of hate and confusion, and his little eyes opened wide in fear, what from?

Then everything went black.

Black, and very very cold.

 _She was being pulled through darkness, towards a light in shades of golden and soft yellows and made of slightly red hues, when eventually she was pulled through, she found herself on a slow corner of a busy street, blurry people walking by, and she was unable to make out any of their faces, stumbling blindly toward the only figure that was clear enough for her to find in the crowd, she made out a small figure leaning against the wall of a small coffee shop that marked the corner, this blonde woman was staring down at her coffee cup, feet scuffing at the ground._

 _This blonde was very familiar._

 _And very stupid._

" _Miss swan!?" The blonde certainly looked like the sheriff of storybrooke, but wasn't wearing her classic red leather get-up. She was adorned in a small pair of black jeans, boots to match quite stylishly, buckled up that came halfway up her shin, a cute though frankly too-small grey and baggy wool jumper and her hair high in a ponytail, blonde curls descending from the high spot on her head, cascading low enough to skim her shoulder blades, when she turned to see who had called her name the small fleeting look of hope on her face descended into a shallow frown._

" _Miss Swan." It came out like a question but Emma just shook her head._

" _Leave." What? Why was she being so openly stern and hateful, what was this place they were in anyways?_

"Emma, _why are we here? What is this place?" Emma stiffened and fully came off of the wall and glared a magnificent hatred at her._

" _Not Important. Leave. Now." The harsh words actually managed to pull the stern woman back from the blonde._

" _Emma this is too dangerous! Dreamwalking is not something I am lightly going to subject myself to without knowing why I am here! What you do not seem to understand that this practice can kill us or worse!" The mayor's yells went unnoticed by the passers by, her words being expressed by her arms flailing wildly to express her point._

" _Regina." She spat out every syllable as though it pained her, which it did. "Later. Leave. Now" She said the last word as though expressing it to someone who didn't know what language she was speaking._

" _I can't, Emma you have to wake up from what this is, you initiated it, otherwise I could be trapped in this realm forever." She spoke softly, arms in front of her, pleading for her to wake herself up._

 _Emma's whole body shifted in response, leaping back from anger to her solemn look of slow depression._

" _I don't want to." She let the words out so softly, eyes on the floor, expecting a fireball to land at her feet._

" _What does this place mean to you, Emma?" Emma shook her head, tears cascading down her eyes, but still, she went on._

" _We were at… his tree." The words came out strangled and caught in her throat, she persevered, fearing her answer. "Who does this spot belong to Emma?"_

" _This is where Tana was last seen alive."_

" _Tana is..?" Emma let the tears fall, knowing Regina would pick them up when she accepted she had to leave._

" _Tana is dead." Regina shook her head and pulled her arms out towards the other woman, as if keeping her there, steady in her arms would anchor her to the ground, but she shrunk away, this place was Tana's._

" _Tana is… was, the only person to love me. Unconditionally. She was true and kind and selfless."_

 _Regina succeeded in embracing the cold Emma in her arms, sobs breaking through her._

" _If you can accept it we can both leave."_

 _She felt Emma's nod as tiny as it was, but the words that sent them home were cold and not what she was asking for._

" _It's my fault she's dead."_

 **OKAY SO FIRST MORE APOLOGIES IF YOU'RE MAD FOR UPDATE SPEEDS AND LENGTHS. I think it's good to end here, no?**

 **The idea behind the dreamwalks is that they're not, they aren't what you're thinking right now but we'll find that out later ;)**

 **Second thing is that I'm not making Emma out to be a murderer here, or torturing them on purpose, It's the same guilt Regina feels over Daniel and this is specific to them because they have gone through similar things so that they can bond over it.**

 **Lastly, Tana's name is as such because it links to regina's, props if you know how :)**


	6. Chapter 6

***Has big grin on face because feels***

 **Enjoy! X**

She couldn't tell if any time had passed at all. When she tried to open her eyelids for the first time it was hard to ignore the blaring light peeping through them, slamming them shut, she tried to push herself up, but the sleeping effects of Swan and her stupid dream walking clung to her and she could still feel the cold hard concrete stable beneath her, holding her there. She took in a shuddered breath from the cold air, feeling a constricting weight on her chest, it wasn't her terror or fear from what this dreamwalking could do. Opening her eyes more slowly this time, carefully responding to the daylight seeping in she took in her surroundings, finally able to tell her body to move, she sat up feeling a slow throbbing ache to her right temple, and a sharp pain to her side, she checked herself over and save for a few scrapes and maybe a bruise from falling, she was fine. When she sat up the heavy weight to her chest slid away. Literally, some of the books she had been carrying collapsed on top of her, others were splayed around her, some fallen half open and she moved quickly to slam them shut, some of them revealing dream interpretations of things she didn't want to think about.

Finally remembering where she was and what had happened recently, she looked around, to find Henry standing his lips slightly apart, as though he was shocked by what had happened but couldn't care enough to help her. No matter, the insufferable idiot 'charming' turned away from the store window he was currently looking into while she had stood and gathered all her books. She had to get away before they thought she was planning something. Henry was turning back to Charming as he took his arm around his shoulder, and that was when idiot number two finally seemed to notice someone was on the other side of the street.

"Regina." he nodded an acceptance of her existence, clutching her son closer to him. _Her_ son! He had no right. Keeping her composure she sneered at him, showing her disapproval, though with Henry here what could she do?

"David." The words spat out from her mouth and she knew it was the only courtesy she was willing to give him, hoping he could acknowledge that too, and leave her be. She needed to go back to the mansion and yell at Emma for her incompetence. Despite the knowledge that this 'Tana' was dead and clearly meant something to her, she clearly had significance to their situation.

And the intolerable first Charming pushed Henry behind him as he frightfully pointed to the spellbooks in her arms. Rightfully so, the bastard should be afraid. Henry shouldn't but she could live knowing she might aid the prince in the defecation of his trousers and sheer embarrassment.

"What are you doing with those?" She couldn't bite back the evil grin that spread across her face, trust the charming's to jump to conclusions.

"Relax." She waved a hand to dismiss him, noticing the small falter of his stance. Wow, really?

"These aren't spell books, they're only informative, and I'm using them to help your hopeless daughter. You should be grateful." She said it as though it were a decree, and it may have been, had she not faltered her queen stance for her son piping up behind him.

"You're - You're helping mom?" Regina turned to him and the Evil queen snare she had perfected both as mayor and as Queen dropped. He was smiling. At her. The Evil Queen.

"Henry." His name fell softly from her lips and he stood forward almost.. Frowning. He noticed the grim look on her face yet he edged closer, she knelt down so as to see him, shifting the heavy pile of books to one side.

"Is there something wrong with Emma?" She could almost cry, he was allowing her to be close to him, but she had to reassure him.

"Of course not, Henry, she's fine." Well that was almost the truth. She could promise that Emma would be better. "There's just.. Some.." She shifted her eyes to charming who was scrutinizing her, sniffing out the small lie she mad earlier. What was she supposed to say? The truth. Henry hates lies. "Look, she's doing okay now, but her magic is, acting up for a bit and so we are working ways out to keep everyone safe." There. That fit the situation. Earning a huff and folded arms from the prince she sensed that as a begrudged agreement of the truth. Had Emma told her ignorant parents anything? Had she even told them why she went there in the first place?

No matter. Henry was smiling again and seemed to deem her words good enough.

"Thanks, I guess!" She nodded and stood back up straight, shifting the books back into both arms, and god they were aching already, how long until she could disappear back to her home and give Miss Swan what for.

Charming was nodding off to the left and looked like he was having a stroke. That's one way to get attention. When he pulled her round the corner to talk she had to crane her neck around the corner to get a look at a happy Henry, when she was quickly and forcefully - how rude - pulled back to meet a prince who was not happy that she was the only one who had seen Emma in a few days.

"What have you done with her?" Well, if you're going to pull someone a little while away for a private conversation yelling the words of such isn't a good idea. She rolled her eyes, of course the shepherd would do that.

"Well, David I haven't done anything. Now unhand me." He stood back and let go of her arm unceremoniously, still glaring at her with a fire in his eyes. " I suspect when you're daughter _wants_ to talk to you, she will, it's not my problem, nor is it my fault that she is isolating herself. Once we deal with our endeavours, I'm sure you and Snow can take her back and sing with the birds and have your family out with the woodland animals but _I_ am not staying for this. I have more pressing matters to attend to." And with that she shrugged him off, stealing one last glance at an oblivious Henry who was talking animatedly with the bug and his dog, and she straightened herself, irritated she couldn't wave her hand sin a flourish for the books while David was the only one to watch her disappear in her signature brand of billowing velveted purple smoke.

"Miss Swan?!" She thumped the books down on the main dining table where she noticed the bag from Granny's diner was still there from last night, sighing she picked it up and all the other remnants of their quick dinner last night and threw them in the bin, turning to leave back upstairs where she could feel the strong pull of Emma's magic guiding her to the next level of her home.

"Miss Swan." She repeated, though a lot softer, the cool light of Emma's magic calmed her down, to a relaxed point where her anger was drifting away, and it terrified her.

"Emma." She spoke while she knocked twice on the guest room door. When she pushed it open she noticed Emma wasn't there. Of course. Miss Swan would make herself at home in the room she visited and stayed in for two more-welcome-than-they-should-be nights already.

"Emma." she sighed, noting the blonde tufts of hair peeking out from under the covers of the bed, and the small sniffles that had stopped on her entry.

She sat down on the bed next to Emma, though she couldn't hear her crying, she could feel the sobs wracking her body.

"Want to tell me what happened?" Blonde curls shuffled around. Take that as a no then.

"Come on Swan, what did you do?" Emma sat fully up and glared at Regina through swollen red eyes that had tears overflowing and left unchecked on her face.

Ignoring her glare, she reached up and sept the tears that had hurt her from her face, leaving her hand to rest on her cheek.

"You can tell me, and then I'll tell you about what I found." This tactic was often something she used to do with Henry when he was little, He would tell her of his nightmares in exchange for a fairytale to help him to sleep again.

Emma sniffed again, leaning in to her touch, she raised a hand up to the one that cupped her face and pulled it away slowly, taking both of Regina's steady hands in her own, cold and shaking ones.

"Tana died because of me. It's my fault." The sorrow etched onto the blondes face was ebbing into the brunette mayor through the magic connection that was spreading between them.

"It isn't your fault Emma. What happened?" Emma shook her head no, but still opened her mouth to speak, willing her brain to form the strangled words through silent tears that would not stop flowing.

"She loved me. She died to save me. And there wasn't even a point to it- I got shit for it anyways."

Regina was the one to shake her head and pulled herself fully onto the bed leaning in close to Emma, now grasping her hands strongly, as though to ground her to this spot and not allow her to float away.

"No." Emma's eyebrows furrowed in confusion, even as Emma's head was down though Regina hadn't missed it.

"You don't even know how she died and you think you can tell me it was worth something?" the words she spat out were meant for hate but through the magic Regina could feel the ache that was consuming the other woman.

"If she died to save you, it was worth everything." Emma nodded non-committally.

"For Henry right?" And that's when the magic between them both fell. They could both feel it, a grief and sorrow and want because though Regina had lost Henry in some ways she had finally come to realise that this might not involve him as much as she wanted to hide behind him for it.

"Maybe in the past, but now.." She let her sentence drift off and couldn't help the happy smile that reached her eyes when Emma looked up and nodded more fiercely than the last time, and the smile never faded when Emma pressed her lips to hers impulsively, soft gentle and kind, she didn't mind the salt that reached her lips from Emma's tears, neither of them seemed to care, because when Emma opened her eyes from pulling herself back, the shit-eating grin she had mismatched the glistening trace of tears on her cheeks, Regina again lifted her hand to wipe the traces of them from her skin.

"Sorry." Emma whispered, though Regina's smile grew wider because Emma Swan didn't mean that at all and she didn't want her to.

"Don't be." And the words were so soft in comparison to her lips colliding with Emma's as her hands cradled her neck, one reaching up to her golden hair.

"Don't ever be." She whispered when they pulled away, and she saw the grin still plastered onto Emma's face she kissed her cheek and leaned into her, lying back against the headboard. And she could feel the pain in both of the invisible magic bonds surrounding them slowly ebbing away, and the warmth she brought to Emma with her touch, loving how Emma's feet had a mind of their own and wandered off to intertwine with hers.

"What did you find out about this dream-walking thing?"

She sighed. The words aloud would make them a little more real.

"Apparently we subconsciously need to communicate through them, that's the most important of what the books told me, I brought some back for further study of them, but there's that and the few things the imp told me through his teachings, though he deemed it an unnecessary skill because of the high cost for failure. He was hardly going to let the caster of his curse become almost cursed when her true love was dead."

"What?" Oh, right, she didn't know.

"Emma I meant it when I said Dream walking is dangerous, if we break the connection without waking up, we are left to a point where the only rousing from our sleep is by being put under a sleeping curse and being woken, no-one else has found another way."

"Not more sleeping curses." Regina chuckled in spite of the situation. Of course.

"I don't think it would come to that, dear. However I do think we need to see someone who knows how to sever the connection before we endanger both of ourselves, not just for our sakes but for Henry's. Unless you have found a true love recently?" Emma shook her head chuckling inwardly. Was regina seriously about to play this game with her?

"Who would we go to for that." At that -simply reflective of her parent's induced by regina titles- _idiot_ comment, Regina rolled her eyes that brought her to face Emma, her head still on her shoulder, curious eyes staring intently at her.

"The man who stayed me from it in the first place. Rumplestiltskin." Emma thumped her head against the board staring back up at the ceiling. Great. That asshole.

"He did help bring you back." As though she was filling in her thoughts for her.

"Emma I think we should go soon, before it's time to go to sleep, I can't risk anything happening to either of us." Emma smiled, seeing Regina's bright hazel eyes shining up at her, she brushed her knuckles softly against her cheek.

"What?" Those bright eyes were imploring up into her own and she suddenly didn't want to move.

"You're determined." She whispered, her eyes fluttering closed as she bent down and stole a soft kiss that lasted about a second, she wanted to further it but the moment was too beautiful to push against it.

"And it's beautiful." Regina blushed and leaned her head back against Emma's shoulder, interlacing the fingers of their hands that had been together since Emma took them in her own, her other arm reaching around to take the other of Emma's on her far side, reaching it out and brushing her lips against Emma's knuckles and interlocking their fingers again like their other hand, and Emma bent down to place a soft kiss on the top of her head.

"Do we have to move soon?" Regina chuckled and Emma felt it ebb through her. She swore she would hear that again.

"Yes dear, I'm afraid we have to." Emma shook her head and lifted Regina's chin so she could meet her eyes.

"Five more minutes?" Regina shook her head as Emma tried to capture her lips again, only receiving a finger pressed to her lips.

"No, come on, we'll have to go now." And Regina pulled herself up off the bed, surprised at her own willingness to lift herself away from the enticing woman who was grumbling while pulling herself up to meet her with their connected hands.

"Ready?" she she cupped Emma's palm in hers and waved her magic to make them appear inside of Gold's, seemingly startling Emma.

"You okay?" Emma nodded and gave Regina a quizzical look.

"Uh, yeah I just thought the whole poofing thing would make me.. I dunno. Queasy?" regina let out a low laugh at that.

"No dear, don't believe everything J. makes up." Emma nodded smiling, and feeling bashful, and when Gold came in through the curtain that Regina wanted to abstain from, because it would remind her of the harsh reality of her mother's death, he didn't even look shocked, poised and composed as ever, barely even paying attention to them.

"We need some information Gold." Gold smiled a wicked grin.

"And what would that be dearie?" Ugh. She prefered the dulled-out curse version whom she thought was oblivious.

"Dream walking. You never told me much about it back in the Enchanted forest. How does one break the connection."

Rumple took great joy in that.

"Assuming that the only reason you are here with Miss Swan is you're thinking that's what this is?"

"Isn't it?" Emma finally stepped forward, and Regina took pride in that Emma was studying him with scrutinising eyes. Good, as she should be

"Well well, I'd have thought you more capable dear" Gold turned to face Regina grinning even more impishly than before.

"What is it Gold, What's your price?" He shook his head.

"The connection between you two is unbreakable dear, but it isn't what you think it is so instead of collapsing under the weight of your books like you did this morning, maybe you should realise you don't get pulled into a dreamwalk. That's all you'll get for free, now if you don't mind, I'll be closing up shop now." And with that he fiddled about with one or two books, and left back through the curtain he came in. Great, Like that was much help.

"What the hell is he on about Regina?" Regina just sighed and shook her head, taking Emma's hand back in hers she let the velvet signature smoke envelop them and transport them home.

But Gold -ever watchful and devious-had noticed, and he knew you needn't hold hands to transport with magic, or at least the Evil Queen of all people was powerful enough not to, so that meant that his previously implied theory was right. And he would have to start studying up on this connection because even though those two obvious and yet oblivious idiots couldn't know it yet, they would need him soon. And he knew his price for the information. They were just clueless about what they had already paid for.


	7. Chapter 7

**Gold knows some random crap as always..**

" _Where are we now?" She sighed, slumping against the stable door._

" _A stable, dear." She knew what stable and where but she also knew that Emma was smart enough to figure that part out, and snarky comments were better than elaborating on her pain._

 _The riding saddle that had held the ring daniel had given her was still slumped against the wood._

 _This was going to be too hard to get through without bursting out into tears._

" _Hey, We can leave, it's your dream, so can't you just change it?" Well, that was one of the most idiotic questions asked by her family._

" _No, dear it's not that.." Actually, dreamwalkers could manipulate their dreams so they could find each other, that meant that this wasn't them dreamwalking, Gold- the asshole- had been right but what were they doing? Was it more treacherous than dreamwalking?_

" _You have an idea?" Emma was so bright and hopeful and god why couldn't they just leave this place._

" _Were not dreamwalking." It was a statement that pushed Emma back, her happy and hopeful face fell, and so did her happy and hopeful stance, she worriedly grasped Regina, trying to see what made her more solemn._

" _What are we doing then, how bad is it?" She shook her head, she didn't understand. Neither of them did. Why were the only places they visited belonging to their past loves.._

 _Gold._

 _That._

 _Freaking._

 _ASS._

" _We have to leave." Emma finally pulled Regina to her and her grip fell as she saw the fear and determination in her eyes._

" _What?" She shook her head and pulled Emma through the stable door and kept walking over the green grass and the land that stretched on forever._

" _Gold. We need to talk to Gold." How was she supposed to tell Emma this? Who had cursed them? Why would someone curse Emma to the pain of this realm? I mean, cursing the Evil Queen is fine, she didn't care anymore, people hated her and she acknowledged that. Once she basked in the glory of it and used it to her advantage. But Emma? She was their saviour! They all looked up to her, why would someone curse her Emma._

 _Her emma._

 _That was something she could definitely get used to. It was the tugging of Regina's arm that got her attention, and then it was the fear on Emma's face that struck the emotion right back onto her own_

" _What's happened?" Emma's eyebrows furrowed in confusion, what was Regina on?_

" _Uh, I don't know how do you plan on leaving this place? Why do we have to leave? What's Gold done now?" Emma, her face slightly crumpled in her confusion looked… adorable._

 _Evil Queens do not think of things as adorable._

 _Insufferable runaway princesses who galavant in the woods singing to their animal friends and dreaming of happiness found things adorable._

 _Maybe those princess' daughters could be considered.. Endearing. At the very least._

" _Emma, I know you understand what this place means to me, but you don't know what this place_ _means._ _It's not something we should be dealing with on our own. I think we've been cursed to a fate… a fate we cannot fathom right now, gold may know what has happened, and to leave…"_

 _Words of magic were something difficult to explain to Emma, how do you tell them they had to be cursed to remember their… their. God she didn't even know herself._

" _I left fleeing on a horse, the way I came, I also left because you pulled me into that last dream Emma, so you accepted why we were here and pushed me away from it, without intending to. We got here because we fell asleep together, but how did we get into this dream? I only really woke up lying here with you waking next to me, so we have to sleep." Emma nodded and lay down next to Regina, the stable in sight below her feet. This was hurting Regina awfully and the pain she felt was somehow affecting her, she felt it and she saw it on Regina's face, a small faint pain she wanted to rid from her forever._

" _Does this curse, make me feel you?" Her words were soft, almost fearful, and Regina understood what they meant but couldn't figure out what she meant._

" _What do you mean feel me?" Emma took both her hands in hers._

" _Is it the curse's doing that I feel what you feel, in myself. The… pain." And the last word she spoke softly before placing a faint kiss to the hands she held so tightly in her own._

" _No, I don't think so. I know you, Emma, and you know me. And I thought it was the connection we shared from the dreamwalking but-" Damn Emma. Why did explaining these simple things make them more complicated._

" _Sleep. We need to talk to Gold." She lifted a hand to trace her fingers through the hair that was lying atop an already sleepy saviour, a woman who was drifting away by her side, and though she couldn't notice it she was falling with this woman, falling for her and falling into sleep together._

"Hey." Emma's face was flooding with relief as she looked down at Regina.

"Hey." She whispered back softly, letting her hand resume its place in her hair as it had been before they fell asleep. "What time is it?" She needed to speak with Gold, he let on more than he was seemingly telling either of them.

"Um. like twelve. Do you need to rest longer though? You've been out awhile." Crap how long had she been sleeping for?

"No, I'm fine dear, we just need to go talk to gold, I'll go get ready and then we'll go. He knows something and by now he'll know what he wants from us in order to tell us like the scheming imp he is."

"What do you know, Gold."

"I'm afraid I don't know what you're talking about dearie."

"You know something. Are we cursed? Did you help someone? Who want to curse Emma aswell as myself?"

Gold held a hand up to silence the former Queen.

"Enough. I know what the connection is you share- and don't try to deny it dearie I can feel the strong magic at play here- And _I_ haven't cursed you, no-one has. Someone Else needs you both to understand each other, to realise what has happened, or rather what will happen, and they're pulling you to each other's thoughts. To your deepest parts of yourselves and forcing you to know each other. Forcing you to feel."

"Well, who did you assist in forcing us into this. I don't like this Gold and you know what I'm capable of. Tell me who it is and I can destroy them."

Emma watched the exchange aghast. Someone was wanting this? Someone was forcing the both of them to open up old wounds? This was cruel, awful.

"Dear I assure you that you will not want to destroy who did this. They're doing it to protect their future. You're future."

Regina conjured a fireball in her hand like the day at the well, and Emma instantly and without thinking pulled on the arm radiating heat and anger and could feel her magic pulling away Regina's frustration from her, at her questioning glare she gave a swift nod letting her know she was here, and it was all okay.

"Why should I care what they're protecting, this person obviously feels nothing for me if they're forcing me to feel pain. Now, Who. Did. This."

Gold laughed at that.

God that was a scary as shit laugh.

And it was terrifying and awful and both women were glad it was over.

"Dearie they aren't even existing yet. They're strong and powerful and reaching back through the veils of time because they can't exist if this doesn't happen."

"Stop speaking your riddles gold, tell me what the hell is going on. How do we stop the dream thing."

"No, I want to hear about this sorceror, nobody has breached the laws of time, why is this so important?"

And he sighed, at their stupidity, and every one of them felt the anger flare up in the room at is. And all of them felt Emma and Regina's magic pull at it and lock it away, pushing it down was one thing but vanquishing it was another.

"You are bound by strong magic, you will be bound by strong magic, you always have been, because storybrooke didn't have any at the time of Miss Swan's arrival, it drove you to think you hated each other, but quite the opposite dears, now this sorceress, doesn't know what she's doing, but it's working, the dreams won't stop until she is conceived and each of your pain has been banished by the other. That is how you stop it. Now I have business to attend to so if you will-" And he was interrupted by a wave of his hands and both ladies being left dumbfounded in Regina's hall.

Very dumbfounded indeed.

 _Quite the opposite dears._

Screw gold.

 **AAAAAHHH! It's short but good, no?**

 **I enjoyed it, and I like gold, he's an ass and it's awesome. X**

 **Review? ;)**


	8. Chapter 8

"What the actual FUCK is he on about Regina!" Regina sighed. Gold was an ass and he knew his riddles but they usually weren't that difficult to decipher.

"Emma the dreams aren't us dreamwalking they're what he said, a powerful sorceress is building this connection between us so that she can be born." Emma flung her arms up in the air, slinking away from Regina.

"What the fuck has this-" an arm flapping in her direction, how lovely."-Got to do with anything about some goddamn sorceress being born! We don't even know who this crazy bitch is!" She sighed, so Emma had been listening to the words but not what they had meant.

"Emma," She reached out and placed an arm warily around her. "Come, I think you need to sit down for this." Emma shrank back again, shrugging of the arm that was supposed to be comforting to her.

"No I don't want anything more to do with this fucking magic thing and sorcerers and dreams and - and- all this bullcrap!" With that she pushed right past Regina and tugged on the door, opening it so hard it shuddered against the impact of the doorstop.

"Emma she needs you! She needs us!" Emma turned and glared into the soft eyes that were almost.. Pleading with her.

"No! I'm done with all these witches needing something with me! Are you working with this unborn powerful witch?!" She rounded up to her, still glaring eyes with hate, pushing Regina back from the harsh and bitterness of her words, the magic around them was swelling with emotion.

"Emma" She spoke softly, to her it felt like being around a dragon, and she didn't want to think about how this felt as familiar as being with a hormonal Maleficent. "She needs us because we are what will help her being born, please you have to believe me." Emma turned and almost sped away from Regina and her touch, when she reached the edge of her grounds she turned her head back not fully wanting to look at her.

"I've been gone for days I'm going home. And don't pull me into a dream again. Ever." And she walked away leaving Regina with the only words she could lash out at that moment.

"You were the one who _needed_ me!"

"Emma, where've you been!"" Henry came bounding into her arms, enveloping her in a bone-crushing hug that literally made her feel as though she couldn't breathe.

"Hey, kid" She got out through strangled breaths. "I've just been dealing with some things that need to be taken care of, but we're all good, for now."

Henry pulled back from her then, a worried look in his eyes.

"Yeah, my mom she said that she was helping you with something. But you're done now and we're okay right?" He looked at her with such hope in his eyes, like he was glad to be away from his mom. Maybe he should be from the Evil Queen, but if Emma had learnt anything these past few days was that this Regina was human. Even if there was some magic higher power pushing them together.

"Emma." Her head snapped up to hear the voice calling her name.

David.

Damn, that guy was her dad, how much more complicated were things going to get before everything would calm down, she still had no idea if she was older than this guy.

"Uh, hi" David smiled but warily took a glance over at a solemn mary-margaret who was still tucked up in bed staring out of the window out into space.

"Can I talk to you for a sec?" Emma brushed Henry's hair from his eyes.

"Yeah, sure." She followed his outstretched arm to the back of the kitchen are, just out of Henry's earshot.

"What were you doing with Regina, we called and asked around but no-one's seen you for a few days, all of a sudden she's leaving her vault with a bunch of books that are 'informative' to help you with some magic problem that has us all in danger? I don't believe a word of it, Emma. What have you been doing the past few days?" Emma shrugged, if she was going to lie she had to make it no big deal.

"Uh, nothing we just had some magical.. Stuff to work out I guess. She tried to help but it doesn't matter. Turns out neither of us needs it." David's eyebrows rose at that. And oh shit, did she just…. Ffuuucckkk..

"Uhm, she needed help from you at the same time? I want the truth, and an explanation as to why I had to take Henry for three days while you just left." Emma sighed, this was not a conversation she had wanted to have, she just screeched at a woman who she had woken up to this morning, who she had kissed and who she had been through too much with who…

A woman who was…

Who was what?

What was Regina to her?

Why did this woman seem to be Evil from a book but in life she was kind and caring and compassionate and loving and..

And shit.

She had left that woman who had only wanted her to stay and made her think she thought the worst of her. But she just needed this night away from magic and witches and curses and being the Saviour.

"David, look. I'm not gonna lie, We had to go to Mr. Gold for his help on this one, he said all this crap about a witch 'ripping apart the veils of time' or whatever to get us into some dreamwalking state thing. I didn't get half of it but we're working on it." David flew his hands up to the roof and eventually settled on bristling them through his hair and turning away to breathe for a bit.

"Great another evil witch coming after my family. I need a goddamn break." Emma scoffed yup. This was another one of those Storybrooke situations.

"Yeah an unborn one at that." Davids head snapped up and she actually thought he was about to lock her away like her foster parents used to.

"What did Gold tell you?" Emma shrugged.

"I didn't understand half of it, but some unborn sorceress or whatever is ripping through time to like, I dunno make a connection between me and Regina, it's weird, it made us do something she called Dreamwalking, but Gold says it isn't that and that this sorceress is our future and we can't stop the dreams. I dunno, I'll deal with that stuff later, but now it's late, Im gonna take Henry to Granny's for dinner. Coming?" David shook his head and nodded towards his wife.

"I have somethings to take care of." Sensing he meant mary-margaret and the state she was in she quietly led the kid to the door.

"What the hell have you done with my daughter?" She stiffened, this fool had the nerve to show up here and yell at her?

"Why hello David, I don't recall inviting you into my home." because she didn't. He just barged through her door like it was his birthright, Honest to the gods, that man was as much an obnoxious Prince as his deceased twin.

"You did something to her, I won't stand for it." God he was coming closer, and she hoped he didn't notice Emma's baggy sweater behind her back, she wouldn't give him the satisfaction

"I did nothing! The future has to make it's way back into the past to break us here and that imp made it out to be something I thought it could have been but she pushed me away! What's she done now, prince? Taking my Henry away isn't she? Leaving is she? Back off to Boston?"

David shook his head and there was something mixed with the hate in his eyes, like he felt sorry for her, gripping the sweater in her hands she willed it away so he couldn't see it.

"No, she's not leaving." And the magic connection she and Emma had ebbed away all of her tense anger and flooded her with relief.

"But, she won't tell me what the hell is going on here. Who is this witch?" Regina shook her head, she had a vague idea, but it was too strong a magic for even rumplestiltskin to posses on his own.

But what he had thought could be possible if? If Emma gave a damn, which she made clear she didn't she was only staying for her family. She'd been waiting 28 years for the insufferable Snow and her prince charming.

"The _sorceress_ isn't born yet. What Gold said, was that she needed to bend the fabric of time in order to enforce the magical connection between Emma and I." David shook his head, confused, what a lovely state it was for him to be in. It reminded her of the way Emma looked when she was..

Nope,

No emma, because Emma didn't care what would happen to her.

"And that she's doing that because she isn't born yet, for whatever reason." Act as clueless as the charmings always are and he'll leave.

"You know what? I think you're lying." How very bold for the shepherd, point gained.

"How very bold, to accuse the Evil Queen of lying, but I do suggest that you leave if you care for your safety because that is the truth, but If you wish to gather more information on this sorceress, then by all means, please do go visit Mr. Gold, he'll be glad of another intrusion I'm sure."

He huffed and grumbled and begrudgingly left, and she only allowed herself to feel when she heard her door slam.

And she stumbled up into her bedroom where she broke down, the sheets were still rumpled from where Emma had left.

Emma had gone.

"Okay gold, I know you know something so what's your price?" Gold sniggered, which for him made David's skin crawl. People can't make that sound. It's… impish and awful. Basically Mr. Gold in a nutshell.

"Ah, but I can't tell you something that has not yet come to pass." He sucked in a breath. Not going to get pissed about this. Nope. Not-Gonna-Happen.

"What's your price for the information on this sorceress and her aims for this… whatever it is."

And a laugh that pierced the air, and god, it was so cold and shrill.

"Simple, your silence to either of the two women involved. They can't know, to know of your future is as dangerous as toying with it unknowingly, which is admittedly, what their sorceress is doing."

David snorted as a response. "I can't promise you anything of the sort, now spit it out." Gold picked up his cane and strutted out from behind one of the counters containing only he knows what.

"Actually, yes you can, see magic knows no bounds, dearie. So, your silence for the motives of this sorceress, yes?" David folded his arms as defiance, but both men knew that he would give in with a little added manipulation from Gold, but David was in the satisfaction of being able at the very least not to show it, or his frustration with the man who so easily manipulated all of their fates.

"Fine, now tell me what you know from this sorceress and her motives against my daughter."

Gold waved his hand using his magic to prevent David to be able to speak to anyone involved.

"Now that you can't tell her, their sorceress isn't going to use anything against them…"

She collapsed onto her bed, after such a long day, begrudgingly she pulled herself back up off her bed, shrugging off her jacket and padding down to take a bath, that would calm her down and relax her before bed, and the kid couldn't walk in on her either asking more questions about if his mom was still evil, she didn't even know that herself.

She walked in and set the water running, shrugging off some of her clothes she stopped to turn the water off and began taking off her clothes again, gasping a little as the cold water hit her foot she sighed and pushed her full weight into the water submerging herself, shuddering a little at the cold she added a little more hot water, sighing from her relaxing state once it was warm enough, she told herself not to think of the past events of the last few days and just to enjoy herself a little more.

That was when she slumped further into the tub, submerged in not just water, but sleep.

" _What the hell Regina?!" She stood forward noticing that it wasn't sunny grassy fields and stables or looming trees they were surrounded by anymore, it wasn't where she had last seen Tana alive either. She was -_

" _Wait are we in your mansion? Am I like, asleep in my real body because I was in the bath and I swear to god if you drown me Regina-"_

" _-Miss Swan, I assure you, you are not going to take any time in this realm, you will awake in your body seconds from when you lapsed into this realm." Okay, good._

" _As for your question as to our whereabouts, no we are not in my mansion, we are simply in a realm that has resemblance to it." And silently, she motioned to the staircase where Emma should follow, walking up the stairs._

" _What are you -" But she was cut off by the mayor opening the door to what was usually Henry's room, which she supposed it was, but it was filled like a nursery, a crib with a small Henry wrapped in blankets as he squirmed in her sleep was what caught her breath, ignoring all the other features of the room._

" _You can't touch him, he is just a creation from a memory in this realm." Regardless, she reached out to touch him, her hand sliding through his form, she settled for hovering her hand where it could barely touch his skin, without going through, telling herself she was able to touch him, tears flowing unabashedly from his face._

" _Thank you." She whispered, thinking regina wouldn't be able to hear it but the woman was studying her reaction to the still sleeping form of the baby she once gave up._

" _What are you thanking me for I haven't done anything, if you hadn't pulled me to this realm earlier I wouldn't have the knowledge that you-"_

" _Regina."_

" _-Wouldn't be drowning in this second in your awful so-called apartment, though I hardly-"_

" _Regina." She spoke more confidently but was ignored._

" _-Think it should be a problem, maybe this time I won't be accused of-"_

" _REGINA! Damn! I'm saying thank you for showing me him, not just for raising him for ten years. I'm saying thank you for being his mom. I'm mostly saying thank you for making him who he is."_

 _Regina nodded, taking in her previous bashfulness and the blonde's outburst though hardly seeming to._

" _Yes, well. It's nothing." Emma merely shook her head and pulled herself closer to the other woman, resting her hands on her shoulders, not shaking her to her senses, because as she was about to do so her eyes found hers and she barely even need speak her next words._

" _It's not, thank you." And she leant in and gently kissing her, warmth spreading through her, realising that maybe this woman wasn't just a comfort or company, that this woman knew her, and showed her parts of herself that even after years were still raw, not in hopes that she could patch them up, but in hopes that she would show herself the raw parts of her too._

 _That was when Emma Swan realised, that -_ oh shit _\- she was head-over-heels in love with the Evil Queen._

 **HAHA! All I'm sayin'...**

 **;) Review?**


	9. Chapter 9

**Sorry for the wait. X**

 **Enjoy!**

She started in the tub, and she realised that yes, Regina was right, and she was thanking whatever gods that were up there that the dream she had, or whatever mind fuckery there was going on with some witch woman, was at least real, and that Regina knew that it was.

And maybe, she was starting to enjoy these dreams even if the meaning of them or why they were happening was messed up. Even if it's all a manipulation, she was succumbing to it pretty fast. Having too much fun being caught up in someone else's spiral of lies. She hoped Regina was too.

And shit, she kinda has to speak to regina and apologise because she screamed at her and didn't hear her out. She has to tell her how she feels, and then they'll defeat this sorceress together.

So yeah, that's what she's got to do.

"Emma." She almost whispered her name when she opened the door.

"I had to come here, like now." Regina's eyebrows furrowed in confusion as a form of response.

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have yelled. I'm just sick of another thing coming in to my life. Storybrooke is crazy and I should have known that before I got angry at you. I'm sorry that I did. And I wanted to tell you" at this she raised her hand to stop Regina's response already forming on her lips. "That even though it's irrationally crazy, I've fallen in love with my mother's enemy. But I have."

And just like the first night when all of this started, Regina slammed the door in Emma's face.

She slumped against the wall, this could not be happening, she wouldn't let it, so instead of allowing Emma and her idiot self from bargain back in again she locked the door, she magically transported Emma back home. And let herself truly sob, felt her heart break, because Emma loved her. And if she allowed herself to feel anything back, well.. Her love was poison.

Love was weakness, was it not?

Emma was a weakness of hers and she had told herself that it was for Henry.

That was why she had saved her and her insufferable mother from the enchanted forest.

That was why she had allowed Emma in, she had told herself for Henry.

But if she loved Emma at all, it would be.. Catastrophic.

She had killed people

She had murdered and tortured and threw fireballs at villages and not even blinked.

And someone had the audacity to say that they loved her.

Henry she could understand, she was his mother, but right now he didn't care much-if at all- for her so why would she say that she loved her.

Because she isn't innocent.

She's a monster.

She doesn't deserve any love.

Her mother showed her that she can't be loved by anyone she had that love taken away from her, her mother had shown her that love can be ripped right out of a person's chest and crushed into dust and dropped on the floor, their eyes cold and unblinking, the heat being torn from their chest, the breath stolen from their lips. Her mother had showed her that love is weakness.

But then; love again.

So could she allow Emma Swan to waltz into her life and take her heart?

Would Emma Swan crush her heart and show her that love is weakness just like her mother had.

Was Emma even capable of such a thing?

Would Emma grow dark if she loved Regina?

Did she even love all of Regina? Did she love the dark and sick magic in her veins that coursed through her and through her heart.

And then she laughed, because really, how could anyone love someone with a black heart, hers was the colour of coal, of destruction, of what was left after flame had licked at life and crushed hearts and tortured and died inside.

Her heart was black.

So was Snow White's.

But never, could she let anyone do the same to Emma.

No one can turn the saviours heart dark, she wouldn't allow it.

Not even herself, she didn't trust that this was strong enough to keep Emma at a safe distance away from the darkness that was inside of her, and the darkness that so frequently outside of her too.

So she would push Emma away.

Because it was what she could do best.

What an Evil Queen, which was all that she was, would do.

She just had to find the darkness, the cold heart inside of her, a place without love, so that she could find the strength to do it.

She had to take her heart out, like her mother, because really wasn't that the best way to eliminate her pain? Just place it in a box and lock away the key.

She wouldn't forget about it though. She would just wait for when a time arose as for when she would need it. Emma couldn't be the one to return it to her, because her heart was black.

So why, when she reached into her chest, fingers enclosed around the frantically beating organ in her chest that was always so empty, beating with a dull, hollow echo, could she not pull it out of her chest. Not without trying of course, she tugged and pulled and it hurt she bucked to her knees tears making their paths down her cheeks.

Because loving Emma Swan was dangerous as well, somehow, this woman had managed to hurt her physically as well as emotionally.

As she felt her body sinking to the cold floor, crashing slowly and without grace, she thought of daniel.

How had Emma swan hurt her more than his death did? Because Emma was alive and well.

Her mind drifted to the sorceress Gold had talked about. She had to know her future would get better, this woman was a hope in her life though the sheriff seemed determined to crush it.

She scrambled to her feet, she was a queen once this was ridiculous.

With poise, she stood magnificently, if she was in front of the peasants of the town she ruled then they would certainly fear her in this moment, but she had to get to the future, had to see.

She tried to remember the incantations and the emotion behind the need to see your future in the spell, she tried directing her thoughts to an unknown sorceress, but yet again, she failed, slamming her hands down on the desk, and suddenly, she collapsed on the desk, not feeling any pain, just swift blue smoke enveloping her.

 _She lifted her eyes, wisps of blue just leaving her. She felt the cool earth beneath her, fingers trying to grip at the ground so she could find a solid bearing, failing as they slid through the sand. She pushed herself up off of the sand, brushing sand off her clothes. She looked up at the almost white sky above her, vaguely aware of the crashing waves, she turned to meet them, feeling slightly dizzy, she ignored it, feet already swiftly moving to take her to the tide._

 _And then she stopped abruptly, because there, was Emma Swan. Goddamit did this woman love plaguing her dreams. A voice in her head told her she should meet the woman who was gazing into the distance, she tried to slowly bring herself to meet Emma's gaze but saw nothing._

 _Correction, Emma saw nothing._

 _Emma saw right through her._

 _Literally right through her, because even though she frowned when she looked in her direction, Regina turned, because Emma had never looked more worried, and as she turned she saw herself, though she watched her closely, her steps were lighter, she had laugh lines at the edges of her eyes, though nothing was happening right now to increase them, infact worry lines were being etched across her face, as she stepped aside, not wishing to be walked right through, she realised this was the future, she looked older, yes but lighter. She wondered just how that would happen._

" _Hey," she was pulled out of her thoughts by Emma's slightly shaky voice, which was talking to her future self, who had her arms in her own._

 _Huh, well that's certainly a new development._

 _She watched as the conversation went on._

" _Hey."_

" _She's safe?" What who needs to be safe?_

" _She's with your mother, along with Henry. They said they'd look after them until it's time to go."_

 _Tears were streaming down each of their faces, and it was hard to ignore the way they watched each other. Closely, intently, and.. Loving?_

" _So, we're really going through with this? I don't want to leave her for long, it's only a week right?" Emma was flying questions around while future regina lifted a hand to cup her cheek, wiping tears away with the pad of her thumb._

" _She'll be fine Emma, we have to go soon though yes, your parents are more than capable, they've had Neal and are used to babies screaming them awake." Who was she talking about, why was she letting a baby of all things be in the care of Snow White?_

" _I know, I just, don't want to leave her so soon, It's been barely a year. She's not even a year old Regina, I just.. What if it won't work? What if we mess it all up?" Future regina sighed._

" _Emma, Rumplestiltskin is never wrong. What happened after Cora is still hazy, you can't shuffle through the memories, so I think it already has. It will work." Emma took in a deep, shattery breath, closed her eyes and leaned against her, grounding her, over her shoulder she looked out to the cold sea._

" _I know, it's just." She was cut off by a press of lips to her own, Earning wide-eyes from Regina._

" _I know. But we have to go now, they'll all be fine" Emma nodded, pressing their foreheads together, interlocking their fingers._

" _For Corinna?" Regina nodded, pushing their lips together once more._

" _For our two children, Henry and Corinna."_

 **OOOOooOooOOooOHHHHHHH.**

 **Review?**

 **;)**


	10. Chapter 10

**So, I don't know if I've said this already but I'll be updating in more frequent short bursts so that you don't have to wait weeks for an update, I hope you enjoy xx**

Shit.

That was the only word that could come to mind, rumple really was a manipulative bastard.

So they had gone back in time or something? To protect _their child?!_ None of this made sense. She needed answers. She hated to say this, but she needed Rumplestiltskin.

So, as it turns out- Rumplestiltskin, once you figure out his first riddle, he'll tell you all you need to know.

Still a manipulative bastard though.

Because now, she had an even bigger amount of questions that she had to ask Emma, apparently. Though she couldn't bring herself to even want to think about her, or any future relationship. She was pretty sure the imp must have been lying, because she's never heard of true love strong enough to just _BAM_ make a child, but apparently, Emma and herself were powerful.

Like she didn't know already. It still didn't make sense, what she had seen prophesied. Rumple had told her that it was their child pushing them into this moment because they weren't already connected. So why did it seem like they were doing it to their future selves? It made no sense. So, she decided to see if Gold was lying, because she needed proof. She was going to accept that yes, she wanted Emma. But True Love? She could never have that. It would crash and burn in an eruption of flames and she would be left alone again, not that she wasn't already. So, It was just as she went to leave her car, ready to face many magical books and items in her vault, doing more research for Emma Swan, did she hit the floor, in a pool of blackness encircling her vision.

And yes, yet again her problem, she concluded, was that same blonde sheriff _again_.

 _She awoke to a void filled with darkness, it reminded her of the place she imagined she would go to when she died, she thought, for a brief fleeting moment, that perhaps, just quite luckily she had, because even if she never did see Henry again, she had just lost Emma again, and she was hoping to find herself lucky to have died and not have to see the pained look on Emma's face when she would next see her. She knew the rejection she had just harshly dealt was really that. Harsh._

 _But she decicded not to think on that, because last she checked, she was just heading to her vault, minding her own business, she hadn't been attacked, -no one would ever dare attack an evil queen.- and she hadn't killed herself, she wasn't going to die without seeing Henry. Or at least seeing him in her last hours before death. She knew when he had left, that she wouldn't give up without seeing his smile, even if it was in a faded old photograph. So no, she concluded. She wasn't dead._

 _And she was only in the one place she could think of,_

 _The dream realm in which she was trapped, apparently by her own future daughter's will, and by Emma's._

 _But there was no scene to play out before her._

 _There was no Emma Swan waiting to turn around and smile._

 _She was alone, in the cold and black and darkness._

 _And maybe she should be glad that this would be the place she would go to when she dies._

 _Because she would be lucky to have this emptiness._

 _She crawls up into a ball because that's what the darkness and cold is forcing her to do, she lies on the ground, cold and alone, because there is no need for her to be proper and sitting and to have her back straight and to be sharp._

 _Because she would be lucky, if she dies, and this is the small kindness she is granted._

 _Freedom to cry in this void._

 _But as she feels she realises, that right now- She hasn't got the freedom to die in this void._

 _And somehow, for the first time in her life. She's glad._


	11. Chapter 11

**My apologies, apparently I can write chapters and forget to actually click the pivotal 'upload' button, so.. Sorry.**

 **Enjoy ;)**

She awoke to the face of her mother looming over her. Great. She was about to go into the dream realm with regina, she could've sworn she had seen her, in the dark, but she was awake now.

"Ugh, whyyy" She moaned, grumbling and mumbling as she buried her face deeper into the cushions of the couch.

"Emma, you should go to the station for your shift, David's waiting for you, And Henry's there too."

And damn her mother for using the Henry card, but she got up anyways.

Cell, badge, gun, keys and classic jacket - out the door.

The day was pretty slow, a three way competition of paper basketball between the three, Henry may have been winning by David's hand, because Emma meant to land that last ball on the floor. Three feet away from the can. She was letting them both win.

Until Emma got a call from a frantic and panicked Ruby on the other end of the line, she was running down the stairs, yelling at david to keep Henry out of this, words spinning around in her head.

 _Mob, Angry, Regina._

Shit, basically.

"Ruby what's going on where's Regina?"

"I.. whale took her, she was tied up and knocked out and-"  
"Where the fuck is she Ruby?!"

She just watched as slowly Ruby's arm raised and pointed to Regina's vault, racing into it, not caring for the ache in her chest begging for air. She would breathe when Regina was okay.

 _If she was okay._

But no, Emma no thinking like that, no one can afford to think like that.

Because Regina was okay.

Even if she was tied up in her vault, whale looming over her. People spilling out and even standing on the fucking stairs.

Even if she was unconscious and people were yelling.

Even after she chased everyone out threatening to lob their dicks off, even if they didn't have one, she would grow one just to cut it off because they needed to leave right now.

Because Regina was okay, she would be, she was in her arms and breathing and that's all that mattered, she would get her home and in bed and wait for her to wake up and stay with ehr and just-.

Regina would be okay.

That's all that matters.

Because she would breathe when Regina did, when she called ehr miss Swan and went back to slamming doors in her face and it was familiar, not just Regina with no expression laying still in her arms because she couldn't handle an empty, lifeless version of Her Regina.

Regina would be okay.

If she said it often enough, she would be okay.

She would give anything to be able to sleep and meet her, but like Regina wouldn't wake, she wouldn't sleep.

Not until Regina was awake.

Not until she could yell at her again, because that would be enough for her to breathe.


	12. Chapter 12

**Would you look at that, a month and I finally have an update. Sorry about that, and I'll also be gone for two more weeks. I know, shame X, But for now, Enjoy X.**

She hadn't slept in days, and people had left her alone all that time. Her.. Snow. Snow was just sitting around moping about the fact she was a manipulative murder, david at her heels doing everything she needed doing. Henry was choosing not to ignore her, she doesn't know how mad he is about Neal, but she guesses it has to be at least a little.

So no one has told her to get any rest, which she doesn't need anyways. She needs Regina to be awake. When she wakes up though, and then she's not sure if she will ever be able to rest, wondering just what kind of a curse the people put her under.

She interviews and talks to everyone and it all points to Whale being the only one to know anything, just like the first mob he had riled up. She goes to him, confronts him more than once, but he just sneers and say he owes her nothing.

Which just adds to her pile of things.

So she's surprised when she gets a visit from Gold. The two people weren't exactly the bestest of friends, that much she can guess (Unless they got real kinky and that's how gold tied her to that chair) but she's even more surprised the imp isn't speaking in any riddles.

"Miss Swan, I see you're struggling with our former mayors situation still" He announces, tapping his cane as he leans on it to enter the room.

She's still a little pissed because the man may well be what has them in this 'situation' in the first place.

"Quit it gold, if you have a way of me helping her, then by all means, speak up. If not, go away."  
She growls, turning to face Regina again, pulling the bed covers up further against her, away as a form of protection against him.

"Actually Miss Swan, I do."

She turns to look at him then, but there wasn't any really indication of a lie, so a subtle nod of her head tells him to continue.

" I was taunting her with how I explained your connection. She foresaw some things - which is powerful magic, might I add - that she wasn't supposed to be able to see. Added along with the things I told her, she no longer draws the same conclusion as she did previously. I believe you both were under the impression that this was body jumping, of some sort, yes?"

She merely nodded, confused and wondering where the man was going.

"Do not tell me you put her under a sleeping curse-"

"-What? How would I- No, more importantly, why would I do that?"

"Ah, well she told you that putting her under, and then waking her up from a sleeping curse was the only way if one of you was left dragged in a void, if you both didn't meet for this 'dream jumping' nonsense, did she not?"

"She mentioned something.."

"But you didn't do that, did you?" He asked distractedly, at her nod, he continued, bobbing his head as he spoke. "Good, good." He mumbled. "Then we have means to act. You need to be put under the curse."

"Excuse me?!" She yelled, standing up to meet gold. "What the hell do you think I'm doing that for?"

"Well, you haven't met her in your sleep have you, so that means your slumber has to be deep enough, and that would mean you would both be in that realm together.." The imp trailed off, shaking his head at his own thoughts. How could the child of true love not have magic powerful enough to make that connection? "..You haven't slept, have you?" He softly asked, and tried to not let it sound so creepy. She nodded, and he motioned for her to sit on the bed next to Regina.

"Sleep. Meet her in the realm, and do not, Miss Swan, allow yourself to be awoken by anything other than natural means. Whatever stopped you from meeting our former mayor last time caused this." He advised, before spinning on his heel and leaving. He couldn't waste such time with these amateurs!

She lay down on the bed, atop the covers and turned her head to look at her. She had already, at many points, tried to wake her up with a kiss, but it was futile, so she just kissed her cheek before turning on her side to look at her, and it was not long before her exhausted body was pulled off to sleep.

 _She felt herself being pulled through a void of darkness, and it was eerily quiet, black surrounding her. It sent chills down her spine but she ignored it and stepped forward._

 _It was almost surprising that she could do that. She hadn't expected there to be anything for her to step onto, but there was._

 _She kept reaching forward, and she was glad to note that the darkness wasn't so suffocating that it would swallow her arm entirely when it was outstretched._

 _She blindly stumbled about and kept calling the brunette's name._

 _She got no response._

 _She kept stumbling forward, which was scaring her almost as much as the quiet, because it looked as though there was no ground beneath her feet, but somehow there was._

 _She called the brunette's name a few more times, and spun around when she heard something to her left._

" _Emma?" It was muttered so softly, she was sure she didn't hear it._

" _Regina?" She yelled out, wincing when she heard it echo._

" _Emma?" She heard again, stronger in the force of the voice but it wavered weakly, surrounded by quiet she somehow had more time to analyse her voice._

 _God, her voice. She was so glad she could hear it again._

" _Regina where are you?"_

" _I don't know, Emma." Came a huffed out response. Thank god for the snark that was the former mayor._

" _Uh, I don't know then. Marco?"_

" _Polo, you buffoon."_

 _She repeated this game of Marco Polo until she was so sure Regina could be next to her._

" _Hey, Regina, I'll just flail my arms about until I find you.." She muttered swinging her arms around in a blind attempt to reach for the woman._

 _That was when her hand collided with regina's shoulder, and the room was suddenly encased in light._

 _Though it wasn't a room, it was where Tana had died, just outside that old home.._

 _God, she thought she'd blocked that part from her memories._

 _She ignored it as she looked down at a Regina with bright red and tear-swollen eyes._

" _Shit, Regina are you okay? What happened?" She muttered, pulling her face to look at her, checking her over before swallowing her in a tight embrace._

" _I'm fine, Emma." She said, patting the blonde stiffly on the back._

" _What happened? When I came down to your vault you were unconscious and there was another stupid mob. Are you mad about what I said, because I can't stop, you know-"_

" _Emma. I am fine. What you said was unexpected, and you really should stop, but it's okay."_

" _I love you then, Regina Mills." Emma smiled._

 _Regina ducked her head and considered what had happened when she had looked to their future. She had seemed happy with Emma. MAybe it was time to give into that thought._

" _I.. love you to, Emma Swan." She muttered, softly still looking at the ground beneath her feet. Glad to have seen something in the darkness that had enveloped her for.. How long?_

" _How long has it been?"_

 _Emma stiffened, and shifted about, but turned her body towards Regina's. Not only that, but away from the house._

" _Uh, three days."_

" _Three days?! How did it get to three days?!" Regina shifted her away when she yelled._

" _Um, well.. I was worried about you, so I couldn't really go to sleep, you know? So I just kinda stayed with you. Made sure you were okay. Then Gold basically told me off for not sleeping because apparently that's how we get out of this. I think he was right."_

" _And you trusted his word?"  
_ " _Well yeah, that or curse you and then wake you up and I thought you were still mad and I didn't think you'd love me so.. I just, yeah. And you'd done all the sleeping for three days while I had done none. I was delirious from sleep-deprivation, you can't blame me." She huffed, lightly slapping Regina's shoulder._

 _The brunette took this in, and then seemed to notice the environment around her._

" _Emma, where are we."_

" _I don't know." Came the terse reply._

" _It's where Tana died, isn't it?" Regina inquired softly._

 _Emma's head snapped up at that, how could she have known?_

" _It's this.. Thing. First Daniel's tree, and then where you last saw her alive, and then the stables, and now here. I didn't see it before, Emma. But they're connected. Next time this happens it will most likely be about Daniel, and I have a feeling these two people, our past loves, they correlate somehow." She offered up as explanation, also supplying a somehow regal shrug to go with it._

 _Emma sighed, before nodding._

" _If we had to sleep last time, what do we have to do this time?" She asked softly._

" _I suspect sleeping again, though I shan't sleep, if only for a minute, on highly unhygienic concrete. Are there beds inside?" She stood, holding out a hand to Emma._

" _Yes but we .. I just, I can't not there." She stood, before interlocking their fingers and settling them down in front of the pear tree that sat at the front of the garden._

" _Sleep here, Regina." She said, before kissing her temple, and settling her head down to lean against her._

 _Regina leaned back against the tree and inhaled the soft scent, that reminded her of Emma, before waking back up, hands interlocked still, in her bed._

 **Review? ;)**


	13. Chapter 13

**Oh, look! I'm not dead! Well how about that, huh? It's my birthday today, and so whilst I have no friends I thought I'd upload a chapter (Jk lol haha, I'm off to the fringe in a minute, LOTR musical anyone? XD) and I got all the Once boxsets, needless to say my family have no idea how much binging they're gonna have to endure...**

 **Anyways, here's a new chapter. Does this make sense? let's hope it does... Enjoy! XX**

* * *

Regina sat up, noting that Emma was on top of the covers, seeing as it was becoming a fast feat to try and get them off of herself. She turns to the blonde who is groggily awaking herself, and sits on her side, the pad of her thumb gently caressing the back of Emma's palm subconsciously.

"Hey." Emma whispers into the silence, and Regina merely nods as a response.

"What's wrong?" The blonde asks, and Regina finds herself wanting to ease Emma's worry.

"It's just... I don't know what to expect when we go to sleep again. It's my turn for a simple term to put it in. It'll be about daniel, and I'm just confused, I guess." She says tentatively, suddenly worried that what she's about to say will hurt the sheriff.

"You love him. I love Tana. I think this is teaching us to let go."

"But I don't want to." Regina speaks so softly, Emma could have mistaken it for the wind, but she heard, and she understands.

"I'm not saying forget them, Regina. I could never forget someone like her, and I know you could never forget Daniel either, that's not what I'm saying, what I'm saying is move one. You've waited something like three decades for him. It's been fifteen years for me, and looking at you, I know our love for both of them won't just go away, but we can give that love we still have to each other."

"Four. Four decades, and it doesn't get better. I never imagined you to have such a way with words, Miss Swan."

"And I never imagined you'd look so good for sixty something." Emma snarked, not minding the fact Regina was calling her 'Miss Swan' in such a vulnerable moment between the two of them. The comment did however earn her a harsh slap to the arm.

"Ow, god it was a compliment! You do look good!"

"Why, thank you dear." Regina snarks, sitting up fully to rest against the headboard.

"I thought your first love was the thief?" Regina asks, spitting out the moniker she gave him quite harshly.

"I don't tend to tell people my first love was a woman. Neal was great, sure. He helped me get over some of my anger and tiny pieces of my grief. I cared for him, maybe I loved him, but not like I loved Tana... She was special. She was my first love."

"I can understand that.." Regina whispered, thinking of Daniel.

"Who was she?" Regina asked, hell, she had a million questions she wanted to ask the blonde, but a bombardment was one she didn't want to throw upon her.

"She was my best friend. We were in a group home together, and we got moved to that house. We mostly just kept out of the dad's way, the mom was a flake in front of him, he wasn't one of the good ones, usually drunk. We were just another cheque to come in. God knows they didn't use the money on us."

She looked down, suddenly nervous to talk about this openly for the first time, she fidgeted with her fingers staring at them intently as if they could give her the will to keep on talking. When she saw toned olive fingers still the movement and slip in between her own, she looked up, and saw a genuine, shy, yet genuine small smile grace Regina's lips. That was enough of a confidence boost. It gave her the words to continue.

"She was fifteen, I was about to turn fifteen in two weeks. Well, I think I guess. I mean, that's the day they found me... anyways, we snuck out to that place, the first one, and she told me to wait there because she had to get my present from the house. She wanted to give it to me early. So I waited, I got coffee for the both of us to share, I could only afford a cup. But she never came back. I shouldn't have let her go alone." Emma doesn't even notice the tears shedding on her cheeks until Regina's soft thumb is brushing them away. "He killed her. He was really fucking drunk and he killed her, and she had it in her hand, she was right by the door. It's the necklace." She points to herself, the one of the swan "It's why I always wear it." Regina held in her gasp from shock, held in tears that threatened to spill, held everything in, and pulled Emma into her arms.

"Tell me about Daniel?" Emma asks, and so Regina does, about the kind, loving stable boy that Cora killed, that she has come to realise it wasn't Snow's fault but if she blamed her she wouldn't have to blame herself. They're both a mess by the time they come apart, tear soaked cheeks that are twinned.

"So."

"So." Regina echoes.

"What will happen next? I don't think I can survive going to another place belonging to her." Emma explains, wiping away the tears on her face.

"Nor can I for Daniel. There's something I do need to tell you, though. About Rumpelstiltskin."

"God, what's he done now?"

"Not so much what he's done. Apparently he knows who the sorceress is that's been causing... all this." She gestures between the two of them, unsure if she can continue, knowing she should.

"Well, what'd he say? Can we stop it?"

"I don't know, apparently we started it."

"I'm lost."

"I know, dear." Regina chuckles, sitting up fully and bringing Emma with her. Somehow during their storytime they'd managed to lay back down again. "Apparently, in the future, there is some great danger in Storybrooke. And we had to save our children, somehow, in the past, - now, that is- it caused the spell."

"Crap. Did Gold do that?"

"Like I said, I have no idea. All I saw was a prediction of our future."

"Okay.. well... can you show me?"

"What?"

"The future. This might be easier to show than tell, right? And I have magic, apparently." She adds, still skeptical.

"It's difficult magic, dear."

"Well can't I just use a dream catcher to see your memories of looking into the future? Or is that way too complicated?" Emma questions, deadly serious and having a wrinkle to her brow Regina can only describe as cute. _Gods when do I find Emma... cute?_

"While entirely possible, dream catchers and memories are dangerous. I was never taught so thoroughly in them."

"But I've done it before."

"On a dog. I'm still quite mad at you for that."

"Right, yeah... well, is it easier than teaching me to see the future?"

"There wasn't much to see, Emma. It was just us, talking about how it was necessary for us to save our children from something unknown."

"Why do you keep saying that?"

"Saying what?"

"'children' as in plural... wait in the future we have more than just the kid?!"

"It would appear so.. I have no idea how far into the future that was, however."

"Damn."

"Yes, 'damn' indeed."

"So, what do we do now?"

"Now? Nothing. I have no clue what this spell is, what we have to save our children from. I was just planning on looking to the future and jumping along our timeline until I can find something of more significance."

"Right. Okay.. good plan... need any help?"

"I think I could, actually. Do you remember what happened with the wraith? How you could open the portal?"

"Uh, I did nothing."

"No, you did plenty, dear. You... kick-started my magic, gave it a boost. Prophecies will take a lot of energy out of me. If you could be near, so I could draw energy from you, I could hold more stamina with each attempt."

"Is drawing energy dangerous?"

"Not for a saviour, dear." Regina drawls, pulling the covers off of herself and picking out some fresh clothes, already moving around in the en-suite and setting up everything for a shower. _Three days, without so much as a simple cleansing spell..._ "You head over to Granny's and collect my usual, I'm in dire need of a shower, don't you think?" Regina smirks as she pops her head around the door.

"Right yeah I'll do that." Emma gets up, tying her boots. "Hey, Regina?" She asks once she's done, meeting the brunette at the door. "I'm glad you're back." She says, giving her a chaste kiss on the lips.

The brunette can't help but smile, even once the blonde has stepped out of the mansion. "I'm glad too.." She whispers to an empty house.


End file.
